Team VRSZ: Volume Three
by NewDreamer
Summary: "Are you awake? Do you know your name? Do you remember anything? Your name is Remus Cobalt, a.k.a the Delta, my fourth experiment of the New World initiative. And today is your birthday." His past finally revealed as Team VRSZ steel themselves for the twisted darkness created by two scientists and for the changes in their lives that are coming for them and their friends.
1. Red VRSZ Blue

**Team VRSZ Volume Three** **Chapter 1: Red VRSZ Blue**

 **Setting: Fortuna**

Violet couldn't comprehend what just happened. A second Remus came out of nowhere, kidnapped the original Remus, then flew off like nothing happened.

"I told you he was a robot!" Silver said a little frantic and confused. "And he comes in a set!" he added stretching his arm out toward the hole in the wall. "Zelts, give me back my fifty Lien!" Silver's hysteria was a cover for his confusion, everyone was aware of that which is why Zelts ignored him, or maybe he didn't want to give up the money.

"Calm down Silver, I-I'm sure there's an explanation for this. We just need to figure out what's going on," Zelts said, but he was having trouble about this whole thing as well.

Violet walked to the destroyed wall to peer outside. There were citizens looking up to see what happened, others that ran in panic, but no trace of Remus or his double.

"Well the key element of this problem just flew off at Mach 9!" Silver exaggerated but he was right, they were long gone.

Violet needed to know what this was all about, but more importantly, she needed to get her friend back, she didn't want to go through this ordeal again. As she stood their steeling herself, members of Vantablack's task force came in. "What happened?" one of the men said.

"I need to speak with Lady Clair. Where is she?" she asked using her official title when addressing those under her employ.

 **Setting: Forest**

The second Remus flew past the desert sands Vacuo was known for and moved to a more woodland area with Remus under his arm. Remus clutched his fractured weapon and readied himself for a fight but knew he wasn't at a hundred percent. His right arm was broken and his rib cage was not in the best of shape, but he had little choice in the matter. Remus actually knew this person from somewhere but it was only for an instant and didn't have that much of an impact on his life so he never thought twice about it.

They were moving through the air very quickly but were beginning to slow down and flying low to the ground when they traveled past the desert. Remus used this moment to land a surprise attack. He gripped his sword in his left hand, swung his arm overhead and it hit the other Remus who let go from the unexpected attack but didn't seem hurt in the slightest. Remus quickly teleported to the ground for a safe landing while his double simply turned off the thrusters at the bottom of his feet and landed on the ground facing his counterpart.

 **Setting: Unknown**

In an unknown room, two people were watching a monitor that showed the battle between the two identical fighters. One person was a man with black hair wearing a lab coat and glasses with a cocky look on his face, the other person was a woman, a fuanus with a white tail beneath a lab coat, and unlike her associate she held a more worried expression.

"Looks like they're back home or at least in range of our surveillance equipment." the man said but the woman remained silent for a while before speaking.

"Amilius, you know I didn't want this to happe-"

"I wanted this to happen. It's time we bring down the curtain on our long project, Lupa," he said interrupting her. He brought hand to his glasses, lightly touching the frame and a screen in the lens opened up. He used his pupil of his eyes to operate the computer in his glasses to perform some unknown action. When he was done, he tapped the frame again to turn off the computer.

"Now let's see who will be the one to spearhead Project: New World," Amilius said and Lupa nervously bit the bottom of her lip.

 **Setting: Forest**

Remus got in fighting stance and ran toward his copy. He jumped to lunge at his foe with his sword and swung it, but was blocked by the double-bladed glaive. Refusing to stop here, he teleported right behind his opponent and tried to land a second strike, but was met with the glaive again.

 _"In my current condition I can't do a long battle. Gotta end this as fast as possible,"_ he thought before making his next move.

Remus began to rapidly teleport around his double, landing one quick strike before teleporting somewhere else. His frenzy let him attack his copy from all angles but his double stood there, moving his arms and weapons to block and matched him blow for blow. Like every battle, Remus' speed would begin to overwhelm his opponents, but it wasn't the casein this battle. He was fighting an adversary that was not only able to keep up with him, but he was also able to effectively block every attack perfectly. Using Checkpoint this frequently was not good for Remus either because using his semblance repeatedly like this always made him feel nauseous and this was no exception. As his speed increased, his double swiftly placed both hands on the hilt of the doubled-bladed staff then he split it into two swords. His weapon, now two, was able to parry Remus and actually overwhelm him before he fell back from exhaustion and feeling a little sick in the stomach. Not feeling like he could win, he looked behind himself to the forest and teleported far away from his copy to retreat to the woods. His double just stood there watching him flee.

 **Setting: Unknown**

Amilius laughed triumphantly as he watched the fight. "Your experiment is failing, Lupa! If anything, he's weaker than the last time, so much so that it's embarrassing. He's really proving your theory wrong."

His colleague, Lupa, remained silent as she watched. _"Let this play out until you find a solution,"_ she thought, looking more worried for Remus.

While she was lost in thought, Amilius activated the computer in his glasses then shut it off again. "Time to bring this fight to a swift end," he said with a smirk.

 **Setting: Forest**

Remus kept moving until he thought he was a good distance away then rested his back on a tree till he slid down until he was sitting on the ground. He laid there until the churning of his stomach stopped and had to think this through.

 _"I-I can't win, not the way I am now...even if I wasn't hurt I don't think I could win this, the difference in strength is obvious,"_ he thought in his head then was reminded about how he lost to Chrome not too long ago. _"This is no different than last time,"_ Remus was feeling disheartened about his lack of ability. He was losing confidence in himself as he gaze fell on his weapon that couldn't last much longer.

He suddenly heard the thrusters of his double get louder, signaling he was coming right toward him. He had his blades in both hands and was slicing through any trees that were unfortunate enough to be in his way. Remus decided to take a note from Violet, to fight smart and also a note from Silver, to fight dirty. He teleported in the air above and in front of the double's path and was ready to time his attack right and plunge his sword in his opponent's back. His tactic was effective, he timed it right and was about to land a good strike, but his plan was thwarted in the shocking and unexpected way. His double disappeared in a puff of red smoke when the sword was inches away from his body, leaving Remus to stab nothing but the ground while looking flabbergasted. Not only did his double look like him, but he even had his semblance. He was given no time to think this through as he felt his double teleport right behind him. Remus felt it again, the same emotion he felt when he fought Chrome, he felt fear.

Remus quickly teleported away, but his foe did as well and teleported to his exact location. Remus teleported again, only to be met with the same result. This was the first time someone was able to keep up with his semblance. This continued for awhile until Remus teleported again to a tree branch, but instead of meeting him at the exact same time, his double was there before him and used his glaive to slash him in the chest and knock him down to the ground. He almost let go of his sword to clutch his broken arm, but Remus was given no time to dwell on the overwhelming pain.

Remus actually thought this may work in his favor since he knows the weakness of his semblance better than anyone; He could only teleport to anything in his line of sight so blinding his double was the best course of action. When his double teleported to his front and was about to land an attack, Remus teleported again but this time, the puff of blue smoke turned into a giant blue fog that covered the area. His double was walking in the obscuring fog and Remus hid behind a tree out of the line of sight, waiting for the right moment to land the decisive blow. He peeked over to see that his double's back with his head moving around to search for him but Remus stayed out of sight. He saw his double teleport but didn't see where he could've gone with his vision blurred. Remus felt a presence behind him, he turned his head around to see his double look right at him.

 _"He teleported to a place he couldn't see? I can't even do that. His semblance surpasses min-"_ Remus thought until he was met with a kick to his already damaged chest.

The force knocked the tree over with Remus on top but he quickly got up thanks to his aura protecting him from any severe internal damage. The two look alikes battled each other in a clash of swords on top of the fallen tree and Remus was obviously on the losing side. The double used his weapon with better efficiency as he changed it between glaive form and dual sword form which bested Remus' own freestyle form of fighting though his form of fighting was currently limited thanks to his broken arm. Remus was hit multiple times by the other's weapon and unable to counter his combos. It didn't take long for his aura to break and for the double to land a punch in his ribs, worsening the damage to them. Remus fell to the ground and his double placed a foot on his chest with his glaive pointed at him. Remus had nothing left, he lost, again.

 **Setting: Unknown**

"AHAHAHA! Oh Lupa, my dear friend, your experiment has failed you greatly. Though he was never going to be a match for the product of my research and ingenuity." Amilius was boasting nonstop and Lupa was silent, feeling nothing but regret in the pit of her stomach. She looked at the defeated boy on the monitor with a sad look which was replaced by surprise at what she saw next. The Remus' double moved his foot and pressed it against the original's neck, who had his hands on his leg to move it off, but it didn't budge. The double placed both his hands on the glaive with one bladed end pointed at Remus's head.

"What are you doing?" she asked Amilius who only smiled.

"I've proven that my methods and way of moving forward were superior, so there's no need to keep a failed experiment." The double was ready to impale Remus in the face and Lupa needed a way to stop it. She came up with an idea that was more of a gamble.

"You're right, my experiment failed. He wasn't able to defeat yours, it was obvious" Amilius smile grew when he heard those words. "You won,despite your handicap."

His smile vanished when he heard _that_ word. "What are you talking about?" Amilius said with a little edge in his voice. The double's motion stopped as he had his weapon ready to kill Remus whenever he wanted.

"Remus was clearly injured before the battle even began, the homing beacon I received was proof of that. It only activates when Remus is close to death, so it was obvious he wasn't going to be in top form. You saw it yourself in the way he moved, the way he fought, his arm was clearly broken and his weapon was gravely damaged. Basically, this fight was one-sided as soon as it began."

"...Irrelevant, whether he was in his prime or not, the result would've been the same." He was pretty unhappy that Lupa tainted his victory with her reasoning.

"Are you so sure that you'll accept this hollow victory instead of waiting to fight Remus in his top form? Or perhaps you prefer it this way, because there's a real chance your experiment will lose?"

He was in his own head, thinking before he came to his decision. "Very well, bring him to the healing tank to accelerate his recovery rate, you can repair his weapon. I'm a fair man, I'll patiently wait for his revitalization however long it takes, then we'll have the fated battle to see whose theory for a new world is better, mine or yours."

Lupa let go a breath of relief. He placed his fingers back on the computer glasses "Thank you Amilius."

"However, I'm also a man who believes 'To the victor go the spoils,'" he said bringing his hand back down.

"What are you-" Lupa stopped when she heard Remus grunt in pain. The double pressed his foot harder on Remus' throat to keep him in place then moved his glaive from a stabbing motion to a position where it looked like he was going to slash him.

"I want him to have a _permanent reminder_ about his failure before he is brought to the Facility," Amilius said darkly while reveling in what he was about to do.

Lupa begged him to stop, but her pleas fell on deaf ears. It was too late to stop it so she closed her eyes, refusing to look at the horrific scene that was about to be displayed on the monitor. The double had his blade ready as he took aim then swung his blade. Remus could do nothing as he watched the blade of the glaive move to to his face.

"AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!"

A fair amount of blood gushed out of Remus and scattered across the ground, with the sound of Remus screaming in pain filling the air. The glaive of the other Remus was tainted with blood at the tip of the blade.

* * *

 **Additional Information**

 **The double's weapon is a double-bladed glaive that can separate to dual sword form. The swords are a counterpart to Remus's weapon, both are weapons have Roman origin. Remus's weapon is in the form of a spatha sword while the dual swords of the double are gladius swords.**

 **The original name of Remus' semblance was Teleportation but he changed the name to Checkpoint. He made this decision after playing video games for so long and thinking that his semblance is similar to checkpoints in some video games. The first name for his semblance wasn't made by him.**

 **I always had Remus' backstory planned out and I created this before I saw RvB and their A.I. programs. The similarities amazed me and in the process I became a fan of the show and Rooster Teeth, they make some great stuff. For the Volume summary I used a reference from RvB to show the similarities.**


	2. The Waiting Game

**Setting: Moneta**

Outside of Moneta, Clair was speaking to her uncle Sterling as she made her way to her new car until she saw Team VRSZ standing in front of it. The look on their faces told her this wasn't a casual visit.

"What's wrong Wallflower?"

Violet informed Clair and Sterling what transpired in Vejovis while Silver ogled Clair's car that used to belong to Absinthe before she took it from them. She refurbished it and customized it to make it look more sleek and much less menacing than it was before. Silver was extremely envious, he missed the good old days when Team VRSZ had a car before Violet blew it up trying to kill him.

 _"Aw memories,"_ he thought fondly.

"I see, this is déjà vu all over again, about a week ago you came to me for help because dear Zelts went missing. And just like last time, I'll assist you." Clair held a small smile wanting to help her favorite freelancers.

Violet smiled a little as well. "Thanks again Clair. It always feels like I'm too reliant on you."

"Think nothing of it. Technically, young Remus is still a charge in my hospital, so it would be terrible of me to dismiss him before he has fully recovered. My men wi-" Clair was interrupted by the sound of a shotgun. Everyone brought their attention to the direction where the shot was fired. People were running away as soon as they heard it. The one wielding the shotgun, walking through the masses, was Vermilion and his sister Vermilya, wielding her giant ax while seductively eyeing Violet's body up and down.

"VRSZ, you have made it on our vendetta list! Meaning we will won't rest until we pay you back tenfold!" Vermilion shouted. Everyone else seemed annoyed by their unnecessary appearance.

"Violet! It's great to see you again. Not a day goes by where I don't think of you and the great time we spent together. My body still quivers when I think of our moment," Vermiliya said with a euphoric look on her face that looked like she was enjoying herself a little too much.

Everyone's gaze fell on Violet who blushed so hard her face was the deepest shade of red. "None of that ever happened!" she defended. "We just fought that's all...nothing happened! Blood and Remus were there they could tell you...Clair where's Blood!" Violet was trying her best to defend herself from the accusation Vermilya was implying.

"Violet is there something you want to tell us?" Silver asked arching his eyebrow.

"Wallflower, how could... how could you, with her and not with me. I would've helped satisfy your curiosity, though I don't know much myself, I would've been more than happy to explore the unknown with you," Clair said pretending to be a little envious of Vermilya.

Zelts placed a comforting hand on Violet's shoulder and he held a calm expression. She felt relief that her most sensible friend understood her plea. "No matter what road you take, I'll always support," he said firmly.

 _"Goddammit,"_ she thought a little livid. Violet couldn't be more embarrassed. Everyone was against her and they lost focus on their objective and the source of the diversion were those two twins.

"Wait a minute...we're missing one dirtbag, the little one in blue isn't here... I guess we'll deal with him later, three out of four is still good, now, it's time for our revenge, you bunch of damn dirt-" Vermilion was punched in the face by an enraged Violet. She was emitting an intimidating aura that gave off the impression of a giant feral Grimm that scared some of the people present.

"This is why I love you," Vermilya said blushing deeply before sprinting to Violet to crush her with her ax. She tried to cleave Violet, who nimbly dodged the weapon before kicking her foe in the face. Vermilya fell close to her brother, both were about to get up until they saw Violet towering over them. Her face was hard to describe, it looked like she was so mad that her face turned red or she was too flustered from all the embarrassment.

"Ready for our second date?" Vermilya half teased and it sent Violet's anger to the place of no return.

Everyone watched the horrific sight of Violet thrashing the twins with her bare hands. Silver and Zelts were terrified, Sterling went back inside Moneta, saying he had to check the posted mission assignments as an excuse, and Clair wasn't afraid like the others, but she knew not to bring this subject up ever again. Violet finished her merciless onslaught and returned to her friends who decided to stop teasing her for their own protection. She wiped some the twin's blood of her face as she looked at Clair like everything that just transpired didn't happen.

"So you'll help us find Remus, right?" Violet asked, but it sounded like a demand because of the lingering anger and Clair sweated a little.

"Y-Yes, my men will scout outside our borders for any trace of our little friend. You can rest easy and wait for a report of what they find, I'll let you know the minute they find something, for now, send those two back to prison...or maybe the hospital will be better." Clair looked at the twins knocked out on the ground and almost felt sorry for them. Violet didn't seem to happy with the terms because they weren't as progressive as she wanted them to be, but she didn't know what else they could do.

"I know what you're thinking, but trust me, this is the best course of action for the time being," Zelts said understanding how she feels. "We don't know where they went so we can't fly blind, especially in the desert." Zelts' words were able to quell her fire. He always had a way of bringing Violet back to her senses, she made a wise choice naming him second in command.

"As soon as they find Remus, we'll be kicking ass and living life like always," Silver added with a cocky smile that helped Violet feel better.

"Hmph. My boys are right," she said like they weren't there. "We'll get Remus back and life will go back to the way it was. Nothing's going to change anytime soon." Violet had a small smile when she said that. She and the rest of her team truly believed they get Rems back in one piece.

 **Setting: The Facility**

Lupa was sitting in a chair in front of a table with Velocitas Eradico on top. She was examining the weapon closely with a scanning device that showed the damage the weapon accumulated and in her opinion it wasn't looking good.

"Velocitas Eradico has reached its limit, it's beyond repair," she said out loud while placing her hand on her forehead in distress. Behind her was a large cylinder tank containig light green liquid as she continued with her examination and deduction.

 _"I shouldn't be surprised that it's damaged, after all, it's only a prototype weapon, and a very experimental one too. The dust inside is quite volatile, and if it takes a strong enough hit, it'll explode and the force would be very destructive. It can't even transform into its railgun mode anymore, even if it could one blast, no matter how big, would cause the dust crystal to go off, for now, the most I can do is repair the sword to a certain extent, but it's on its last leg,"_ she thought then looked back at the cylinder tank.

 _"Hmmm, the only alternative to reduce the volatility is to find a way for the energy to be used without expelling it from the weapon,"_ she thought to herself then had an idea. She immediately took out a notepad and wrote down some plans for Velocitas Eradico. _"This could work."_

While she did this, Amilius entered her laboratory and strutted until he stood behind her. Her peeked over her shoulder to see his was working on the sword. "Making some last minute modifications to the prototype? I doubt that'll help. He never used it properly to begin with, I mean, who sees a sword like this and wields it in a reverse grip the moment they get it in their hands." He walked to the container like he owned the room. Lupa didn't like his presence in her private work-space. They made an agreement that their private research and development areas were off-limits to the other and Amilius was clearly violating this rule. With his supposed victory not too long ago, he was basically bragging by breaking their rule. Amilius looked at the tank with a grin then knocked on it several times with the back of his knuckle.

"Don't tap on the glass!" she said gnashing her teeth in anger.

He stopped tapping but looked on."What do think did this to him? You originally designed him to be unbeatable, though he never finished the training process, but still, what could've been powerful enough to nearly kill your lab rat?" Amilius asked truly curious.

"There are an infinite amount of unknown variables in the world of Remnant. As scientists we must accept the fact that there are things we can never be prepared for no matter how prepared we claim to be," she said in a matter of fact tone before turning to face him. "He was never complete, he wasn't ready for the surprises of the outside world just like anyone else, but what you did to him was completely unnecessary, cruel, and unforgivable. He won't be able to get it back no matter how strong the recovery chamber accelerates his body's healing ability. It can hasten the healing of injuries, mend broken bones, but it can't replace organs!"

In the tank was Remus, naked, floating in the liquid wearing an oxygen mask with a tube connected to an oxygen tank placed next to the liquid tank. He was unconscious inside there and he had something new, or for better words, he lost something. Remus' right eye was gone and there was a small horizontal scar where his eye used to be. The scar started to heal a little, but a thin line remained. The eye socket remained closed, it no longer had a reason to open.

"I felt a tad bit overzealous and perhaps I went overboard , I can admit that, but since we're having consecutive matches think of it as a tally to show who won the first round," he said like it was a viable excuse and it didn't satisfy Lupa's anger. "His body will return to normal, your little project will just have to adapt to having one eye." That was the last straw. Lupa sprung from her seat and looked at her so called friend with furious eyes.

"Get out," she said in a low threatening tone.

"...Very well, I'll leave." Amilius walked to the door but stopped to tell her one more thing, "Just remember one thing Lupa. He's the Delta, mine is the Alpha, he will forever be inferior no matter how much you prepare him. And don't think about trying the same stunt you did the last time, he won't make it out of here alive this time. I'll make sure of that." Lupa's shoulders dropped when he said that.

"You failed as a scientist Lupa, you bonded and grew attached to a test subject despite the possible end result. Emotions bring forth much more ruin than weaponry and war. I didn't get attached and because of that I have a true masterpiece, the closest thing in the world to perfection. Learn from your mistakes and you might have a better shot with Epsilon if you choose to start from scratch again, just stay professional this time." He ceased his lecture then took his leave.

Lupa felt pain at what he said, but not from Amilius demeaning her profession as a scientist, but from his cruelty toward Remus in both action and words. She knew her colleague always hated Remus, but she never thought he would do something like cut out his eye to prove a point. She looked over to Remus who was floating in the tank.

 _"Remus, I'm sorry. I don't think I can stop apologizing for the things I did to you, for what we did to the both of you. I don't know how long you'll be in there or how long I can prolong this, but I'll try. It may be unprofessional as a scientist to say this, but I hope a miracle comes to stop all this once and for all,"_ she thought looking at the boy in the healing chamber with sad eyes.

Outside Lupa's laboratory Amilius was pondering some inquiries that piqued his curiosity. "I always knew that boy was destined for failure, but still, what was out there that was strong enough to harm him to this degree?" he asked to himself then grinned a heinous grin then chuckled to himself as he left to his own workplace.

 _"He was found in Fortuna? Maybe there's something worthwhile in that nameless place, after all, the things we expect the least from sometimes brings forth things we least expect. If she's preparing her Delta for battle, then there's no reason why I can't do the same with my Alpha? A few battles will strengthen it to my liking,"_

He activated the computer in his glasses looking for the exact location of Fortuna. Somewhere else in the Facility the Alpha was standing motionless in a claustrophobic capsule. He didn't show any signs of fear, anxiety or any emotion at all. His face remained stoic, blank, completely void of anything the entire time just like his earlier fight with Remus.

* * *

 **Additional Information**

 **Clair de Lune flirts and teases Violet a lot but she is in fact bisexual. Vermilya is just crazy and attracted to anyone who is good at fighting, unfortunate for Violet that she caught her eye. Violet is straight but people assume otherwise and she is very tired of defending herself.**

 **I always planned on one of the members of VRSZ to be mutilated in some way. The choice was random and it fell on Remus to lose his eye and receive a new scar adjacent to his eye. This would be his second scar with the first being the one across the right side of his head. Actually, I feel like after what happened to him at the end of Volume Two and what's happening to him now, he's getting hurt a lot more than the others ever did. For now he'll just have to endure it all because it's not over.**

 **I'm going to try and make the Vermilion twins recurring characters like I'm trying to do the same for Buff. Team VRSZ is on their enemies list and the team feel like anything the twins will probably be their responsibility in the future.**

 **I'd like to make a shout out to Toy2711 for being a fan of the VRSZ volumes and to Cztm who actually binge read the entire VRSZ series. I'm glad you guys enjoy this fanfiction.**


	3. Fight in Fortuna

**Setting: VRSZ Base**

Violet was reading a comic book as she sat on the living room sofa while Zelts made himself a sandwich at the kitchen island and Silver sat on the ground in front of the big screen TV in the living room playing video games. Silver let out a big sigh that caught everyone's attention.

"What's wrong with you?" Violet asked.

Silver pointed to the screen. It showed that he made the new high score on the game. "You're upset you won? That's bad?"

"I'm upset because I never get the high score with Remus around. He dominates every game here and I guess I got used to losing to him," Silver said with his head low. Violet and Zelts understood how he felt, they missed him too.

It has been two days since Remus' abduction. Clair's men have been searching throughout the entire desert but haven't find anything that could lead to their lost friend. The lack of news made Team VRSZ, especially Violet and Silver, more anxious. With their search widening, the task force were currently searching out near the desert's borders which was quite a distance showing that they are taking this seriously.

"If you want, I can kick your ass in video games," Zelts offered, humoring his friend.

Silver looked his way on thought it over. "Thanks but it wouldn't be the same. Remus had a certain flair when it came to winning, he made you feel like a winner even if you didn't win, besides you're no better than me when it comes to these games."

"You suck at shooting games, anyone could beat you." Zelts' comment seemed to strike a nerve with Silver.

"Yeah, I don't understand how a trained gunman can suck at shooting games?" Violet added and it ticked Silver off.

"Look! Just because I can shoot a gun in real life doesn't mean I'll be good at pressing buttons to shoot a gun in video games! The skills aren't transferable!" This type of subject obviously didn't sit well with Silver.

"So... Did you hear anything from Clair?" Zelts asked Violet wanting to changing the subject.

"Nothing to report so far but we shouldn't worry, the lines of communication her task force is using is pretty good. The minute any of them find something, she'll know immediately and we'll know so as something comes up."

"Her forces are pretty capable, she even sent Blood out there to search so we know it'll work out. Let's kick back and relax," Silver said ready to start a new game.

"He's right, we all know Blood used to be a bounty hunter, tracking should be easy for him. And he does have a fondness for Remus so he'll be more determined to find him," Zelts added.

"Clair did tell me that she was thinking of sending Ghost and Bianca out there. I guess we can wait patiently," Violet said finally feeling a bit better about their predicament.

Silver, on the other hand, jumped up from his laid back position. "Bianca's heading out there?!" he asked turning to Violet.

"...Yeah, Clair told me that she was ready for field work so she partnered with Ghost and they're about to leave to help... W-where are you going?" she asked Silver who got up and walked to the door.

"We should probably help out, I mean Remus is our friend after all. Let's go... uh, where is Bianca again? Maybe we can team up to... cover more ground." Silver said feigning interest in searching. His reason for wanting to get involved was so transparent, he really wanted to see Bianca again. Granted the last time they saw each other was when she was trying to kill him and he encased them both in an icy tomb.

 **Setting: Desert**

Far away from Fortuna, several groups of Clair's task force were scouring the land to find Remus or any tracks or hints that could lead to a trail but found nothing. There was nothing out of the ordinary that could be identified as the men looked around. In the skies above, Blood was flying to see things with a bird's eye view, but he too saw nothing as he made his way to the edge of the desert. The bat faunus saw the grassland that divided itself from sandy landscape and saw the trees of a forest. Before venturing any further he flew back to his team's meeting point.

"It's clear whatever we want to find won't be in the desert, any clue would've been lost in the shifting sands by now. We're going to expand the search to the forest, maybe something will show up there. I'll scout ahead, relay to the others that we're expanding our search to the woods," Blood said to his second-in-command before taking off.

He soared through the sky until he was over the trees. He saw nothing until he noticed an anomaly, a row of several fallen trees. Blood looked at one of them and noticed it was a healthy tree that had no reason to suddenly fall over, at least not on its own. Then he took notice of how the tree was removed from its base _. "This was done by someone and the precision of the cut. This- no, they were all cut down the same way and by some kind of blade. Could Remus have done this? He'd be capable, but he isn't the type to attack plant life for fun,"_ Blood deduced. He saw a lone fallen tree that didn't look like it was cut down, more like it was knocked over. He walked to it and smelt the scent of dried blood.

 _"Animals hunting another or the casualty of battle?"_ Blood thought. He scanned his surroundings, he saw and heard nothing. No sign of birds or rustling bushes indicating wildlife on the move, just silence. He flew up in the air and looked around for any signs of life but he found nothing in his search _. "Ominous, there is no wildlife in this forest, not even a stray Grimm... what is this place?"_ he thought trying to understand the situation.

As he stayed in the air he heard something, the sound of an engine. He turned to see something flying toward him at high speed. Before he had time to react, the flying object passed him. Blood brought his hand to his ear piece to transmit to his squad what he just witnessed and to relay it to Clair as well, the object was making a beeline for Fortuna. After notifying his team Blood took off to follow the unknown object, but he was unable to match its speed and was falling behind.

 **Setting: Fortuna**

VRSZ walked to Concordia to intercept Ghost and Bianca before they left for their scouting mission, more like Silver wanted to intercept Bianca before she left while Violet and Zelts played catch up with their friend who was speed walking to their destination. They were trying to keep up but Silver was a man on a mission. Instead of catching up to him, Violet accidentally bumped into someone she hasn't seen in a while.

"Oh, sorry Cerise I-" Violet paused as she got a closer look at Cerise. The girl stood there smiling, nothing different about her outer appearance but Violet sensed something else. Cerise was attending Fortuna's training academy to become a full-fledged huntress, she and her teammates have been undergoing instruction and guidance, gaining experience and it showed. Cerise seemed more discipline, grounded, she was completely confidant in her abilities as a fighter and a leader. Violet saw a little bit of herself in her, she was reminded of the first time VRSZ decided to be a team and it made her happy.

"Violet?" Cerise said not sure why her senior paused so she turned her attention to Zelts. "Hey Zelts, how are you guys doing? Going to see Remus again?" she asked. She and the rest of team CLSH heard what happened when VRSZ was in Never-End for a week and lent their support by visiting Remus every once in a while but they weren't aware of recent events. Zelts informed her of what happened while Violet got a call on her scroll. "All that really happened? Is he-um...I'm only asking because Silver brought it up to us once, is Remus a robot?"

"He eats, he bleeds, and he uses the bathroom, I highly doubt robots do that," Zelts answered a little tired of defending his friend from the rumor Silver spread. Their conversation was cut short by Violet.

"Zelts! Clair said something is flying towards Fortuna. It could be the...other Remus."

"What are you going to do?" Cerise asked hoping she could help out in any way she could.

"Like Silver said before, he's the key element in all of this. We find him, we find Remus so we have two things to do when we encounter this fake; capture and interrogation," she said determined to get to the bottom of this unknown dilemma.

 **Setting: Concordia**

Silver was way ahead of his friends though he didn't notice because he never bothered to look back. He made it to Concordia and was about to enter the building until something odd grabbed his attention. He saw a familiar figure fly through the air.

" _Remus 2.0, his upgraded version decided to come back for a rematch huh?"_ Silver thought as he moved to intercept.

Violet, Zelts, and Cerise made it to Concordia where they searched for the double of their missing friend. Remembering that he came from the sky the first time they encountered him, they kept their gaze upward. Zelts was the first to find him. The Remus copy hovered in the sky, moving his head like he was searching for something. Zelts alerted Violet and Cerise then saw something else happening up there.

The Remus double was searching the area for something, then out of nowhere, Silver jumped into its blindspot with his aura glowing from Gravity. He struck the double in its temple using Ceasefire in escrima mode and the double descended a little before regaining its composure. Silver used Gravity to land on the side of a building where he stood and contemplated what just happened.

 _"I knew it. When I hit him I heard a 'clang'. He is a robot,_ " he thought as the machine came back for more.

It grabbed its glaive and clashed with Silver as his friends stood at ground level of the four story building. As Silver went head to head with the double he could tell that it was a much better fighter than the original Remus. He was losing ground quickly until Zelts intruded into their bout. The man spun around to envelop himself in a miniature tornado that helped him fly upward then clashed with the flying double. He could tell this thing was stronger than most opponents he has faced before because he was able to withstand his attack. The double pushed Zelts off into the building wall. He almost fell to the ground until Silver grabbed his hand. They were open for an attack but it never came. For some reason the double was having some kind of trouble, like it was malfunctioning as it continued to struggle. Violet appeared out of nowhere, deactivating her semblance showing she was perched on top of the double's shoulders and landed several two strong punches to the sides of its head and wrapped her arm around it to strangle it.

The fact that the double wasn't unconscious or gasping for air made her realize he wasn't human and the metal exterior she felt meant Silver was right about one thing, it was a robot. The double quickly grabbed the back of Violet's shirt and tossed her into her friends. She crashed into them and they were falling to the ground.

"Silver!" Violet shouted and he knew what she wanted from him.

He kept Gravity active. Silver increased gravity's effect on him to quickly fall to the ground first, then reduced it to land safely. Next he jumped into the air to grab hold of both his teammates' hands. With gravity's effect almost lost on him, he spun his body and tossed Zelts up toward the double with Gravity removing most of his body mass. Silver did the same for Violet once he spun around again and tossed her.

Spinning around, Zelts came at the double like a top as he clashed with the robot that defended with his glaive. The spinning force behind Zelts' attack propelled them both upward when he finished attacking, then Violet came up with one of her daggers in one hand and two throwing knives in the other. She threw each throwing knife at the thrusters and they exploded, not destroying the legs but disabling the thrusters. As the double fell, Zelts brought his wingblades back to form his shield and Violet used it as a foothold. Violet jumped p toward the falling machine and she slashed its chest and chin, but it didn't leave a dent. Before the robot could perform a counterattack, Violet quickly jumped off the robot, leaving one of Cerise's cherry bombs in front of it before it exploded in its face.

The double was falling to the ground while Silver used Gravity to run up the building and catch Violet as Zelts used wind to help his own descent. The double saw this before teleporting safely to the ground. When Silver brought his teammates to the ground, they continued their pursuit.

 _"He...or it has Remus' semblance. It doesn't just look like him, he has the same abilities,"_ Violet thought then came to a realization. "If has the exact same semblance, then he probably has the same weakness as well. We have to blind him." she said and Cerise perked up.

"I can help with that. I asked Hazel to help me create new Runaways, they're flash bombs," Cerise said pulling out a few of her cherry bombs impressing those around her. Violet could see she was maturing quickly as a huntress despite her young age.

They were given no reprieve as the double teleported to their exact location and swung his glaive at all of them. Zelts wasn't prepared to guard with the Wings of Icarus, so the best he could do was use his body to take the hit that Cerise would've taken. The two were pushed back along with Violet and Silver who took the full force of the attack but they were able to land on their feet then quickly moved in to attack with their team attack **Thick As Thieves**. Cerise and Zelts used the free time they were given to divide the flash bombs among themselves.

Violet and Silver concluded that whatever this thing is, it's definitely stronger than the original Remus. Silver's Remus 2.0 nickname wasn't too far off, even using their team attack wasn't enough for the robot to falter as it kept up with each coordinated attack. Even though Violet and Silver helped each other dodge attacks when they use this move, they were barely making it out without a scratch and it didn't seem like they could keep it up forever.

The robot divided its glaive to dual swords mode, Silver still had Ceasefire in escrima mode and the two clashed. Each held their ground, but Silver couldn't hold on for much longer, luckily he didn't have to. Violet ran to Silver from behind, jumped on his shoulders, then leaped again to land a cut on the robot's face using one of her daggers. Silver used this moment to grab Violet and fall back. The move was effective, it left a jagged diagonal mark on its face, but because it was a robot, it didn't feel pain and it didn't stagger from her frontal attack. Instead, it teleported right in between the duo as they were moving back, disrupting their plan for a tactical retreat.

Before the robot could strike again, it was hit by a blast of wind that was strong enough to push it back. The robot skidded across the ground then looked at culprit, Zelts, who was smiling. The sound of something falling and rolling on the ground was heard. Looking down, the robot saw cherry bombs scattered around its feet. Cerise and Zelts used the wind to protect their friends and to carry the Runaways to their destination. Violet and Silver shielded their eyes as the multiple flash bombs went off covering the robot in an incredibly blinding light and its optics were temporarily scrambled.

Before Violet, Silver, Zelts, and Cerise could strike again, before the double's optics could recover, something flew into the battle. Because of the light who or whatever came by was seen as a blur, a blur that headed toward the robot and landed a strong powerful punch to its face, sending it hurtling toward a building. When the light finally died out, the others watched as the blur slumped to the floor and with their vision fully restored, they saw that it was Ash Blood who attacked the robot but he was on all fours and panting for air, he was sweating and looked completely exhausted.

"Blood?!" Violet said as she approached him as he got back to his feet.

"I'm fine. Flew all the way from the other side of the desert and I'm pretty tired," he said catching his breath. "Now, tell me who the hell I just knocked into a wall."

Violet was about to answer, but the subject to the question walked out of the rubble. The answer to his question left Blood a little confused. Before him was Remus but taller and wearing crimson red instead of cobalt blue. "Um..that's more than meets the eye."

The double vanished in a puff of red smoke and appeared behind Silver. Zelts unleashed another powerful gale to knock it off its feet. Silver used Gravity to make his body heavy and stay in place while the double was swept away, but the double failed to meet his expectations, instead he did something that surpassed anything he or anyone else thought was possible.

The robot activated Gravity and did the same move Silver did, it stayed in place as the wind blew past both of them. Silver was too stunned at what he just saw to counter the upward slash he got from the glaive and because Gravity was still in effect, so his body remained in place as he took two more strikes. Before Silver could do retaliate, the robot fiercely grabbed him by the arm and activated Gravity again, but he took it even further by overriding Silver's Gravity with his own, making Silver extremely light, then tossed him highly in the air.

 _"He- He's using my semblance! And he's better at it than I am!"_ Silver thought as he soared through the air. The robot then began to levitate in the air without the use of its disabled thrusters, then ascended in the air moving toward Silver. The robot used Gravity to remove gravity's effect on its body entirely, allowing it to fly. Silver watched something else use his semblance at a level he could never attain.

 _"I...I can't do that,_ " Silver thought as he activated Gravity to stop his body like he was in zero gravity and remain in the air, but he was slowly descending as the robot grabbed its weapon and continued coming toward him. It gripped its glaive ready to plunge it through Silver's spine.

* * *

 **Additional Information**

 **When Silver heard Team CLSH was attending school he felt envious because they get things like spring break and almost joined as well. This was stopped by Violet who told him that because of how they live they're practically on break any day they aren't working. That and the fact Silver will have to _go_ to school turned him away from the idea all together.**


	4. Beta Testing

**Setting: Facility**

Amilius was watching the monitor in his laboratory and he seemed to be tripping on himself with glee. He was viewing the battle going on in Fortuna through the optics of the double. Despite how he holds himself to his profession as a scientist, Amilius was like a kid in a candy store.

 _"All these willing participants offering to help strengthen my Alpha. And some of them are from the hospital too, I guess they pitied the Delta enough to be his friends. No matter, they'll play their part and give my Alpha the power boast it needs, It has already acquired the powers of the boy and the girl, what else can I take from them? Show us more,"_

 **Setting: Concordia**

The robot was moving in to kill Silver by running its glaive through through back. Silver changed Ceasefire into guns and unleashed a hail of gunfire. Seeing as how his opponent wasn't alive, Silver saw no reason to use his aura to nerf his bullets. He did this but it wasn't enough to slow or even dent the machine. Lacking the firepower needed to take this thing on and being stuck in the air, Silver didn't know what to do next.

His problem was void when he saw Blood fly up and intercept the robot that quickly attacked him with a swing of its blade. Blood nimbly dodged the weapon and used his fists to strike his foe in different areas. The attack failed to do anything except grab the robot's attention, showing how the machine's exterior was very tough. The two began an aerial bout as Silver used this free time to activate Gravity and safely fall to the ground. As he did, he saw Zelts cloak himself in wind and fly upward to the battle. The doppelganger split its double-bladed glaive into dual swords and continued to fight Blood who swiftly evaded each strike, but he was feeling frustrated when he figured out this thing was a machine.

 _"My Paralysis doesn't affect non-living things. This is going to take a while,"_ he thought in the midst of battle. Being one of the most capable fighters in Fortuna, Blood was able to hold his own much better than the others, even in the air as he continued to trade blows with the robot.

They were at a stalemate, but the Alpha used Remus' Checkpoint to teleport behind Blood and slash him hard in the back. His prowess with Checkpoint was better than Remus as he repeatedly teleported and attacked Blood from every angle, similar to the move Remus did when he fought his double the first time. Blood was feeling the pressure and his aura was getting lower. Before the Alpha could land another strike, it clashed with something else, something unseen. Deactivating Invisibility, Violet appeared standing on Blood's shoulders with a Vorpal Sword dagger blocking the attack. Blood used this moment to land a very powerful punch that sent the robot into a building. Zelts asked Cerise to climb on his back then he spun his blades around to cloak himself in a tornado and flew up to Blood and Violet's location.

As soon as the robot emerged from the building it was faced with a new opponent, Zelts, in the air with Cerise riding on his back. He slammed both his wingblades against the robot's back and it plummeted to the ground. Before it could hit the ground, the Alpha activated Gravity and it stopped its fall by levitating its body at the last second. It would've landed face first but it looked like it stopped time before it could crash and burn. Before the robot could re-center itself, it saw several Runaway cherry bombs fall around it. They exploded, consuming the robot and setting its surroundings on fire. Zelts used his blades to create winds to help them descend to the ground while Violet got in Blood's arm as he flew back down to the ground as well. They regrouped to decide what to do next.

 **Setting: Facility**

Amilius couldn't see anything on the monitor but the flames from the explosion that engulfed the Alpha. Despite what just happened he didn't seem worried in the slightest. He activated the computer in his glasses to check the Alpha's status.

 _"As expected, not a whole lot damage. Guess that proves the metal alloy is holding up nicely, though the one with the shield is doing more damage than I anticipated. Perhaps his shield is made of a much stronger alloy than my own,"_ Amilius thought before smiling then chuckling.

"Delta, Delta, Delta, you've surrounded yourself with some fascinating people. Unfortunately we can't stay for too long, no need to draw any more attention than we already have. Show me one more semblance before we take our leave."

 **Setting: Concordia**

"That thing is not going down," Silver said feeling a little tired and worried how this was going to end.

They were all worried. Unlike them, the Alpha couldn't tire, it couldn't feel pain, and was throwing their semblances back at them and doing so with much better proficiency. Even Violet, their tactic specialist, was having a hard time finding a light at the end of this tunnel but she did know one thing they had to do in order to increase their chances of winning.

"We can't use our semblances anymore," she said to everyone and they looked flabbergasted so she explained. "That thing is copying our semblances and using them against us. So far it can use Remus' Checkpoint and Silver's Gravity, we can't increase its arsenal any further."

 _"If it has Remus's semblance then-"_ she shook her head refusing to believe Remus was defeated or worse.

"Silver, since it already has your semblance, you can continue to use yours. Blood, I noticed when you tried to use your semblance before, it didn't copy it or for better words it couldn't because it was unaffected, therefore it didn't notice. I'm guessing that it can only copy semblances that it can see so-" Violet was interrupted by the Alpha teleporting between all of them.

It swung its body and sword 360 degrees, hitting everyone and knocking them all back. The robot chose Cerise to be its first target as it quickly moved to her as soon as she landed on her back. It tried to stab the young girl by bring both its swords down on her but failed. By instinct, Cerise activated her semblance, Shields, and protected herself by creating a spherical force field around her that deflected the robot's attack. However revealing her semblance and showing it to the Alpha gave it the ability to copy it.

 _"Damn, she had no choice,"_ Violet cursed inwardly. She knew Cerise had to rely on her semblance for such an opponent. Even if she and her teammates are receiving proper training they were still novices.

The robot continued to attack the shield and it began to crack under the constant assault. Before that could happen, Blood and Zelts quickly intervened. Blood in front of him and Zelts on his backside, both ready to strike together but the Alpha teleported away, further out from its original position. Cerise used this moment to deactivate Shields and threw some Runaways at its feet. They exploded and encased the Alpha in ice. Violet reacted to this by throwing some of her own ice Vorpal Swords to further trap the monstrosity. This move proved effective as the Alpha remained stuck in its ice prison.

 **Setting: Facility**

"They're a very resourceful lot that refuse to give in. I guess this is what Lupa means about people's inner potential. Humans are so annoying, they don't know when to stop, but I do. I've acquired another power and I thinks that's all I'm going to get from them," Amilius said as he activated the computer in his glasses. "Time to take our leave. Now's definitely a good time, the cavalry's coming."

 **Setting: Concordia**

Approaching the battlefield were two familiar faces. Silver was the first to notice and his eyes widened. He saw two people he hasn't seen in a very long time. The first was his pale friend Ghost accompanied by his older half-sister and Silver's old friend/senior/former gang member, Bianca. Their eyes meet and Silver held a dumb look on his face. Despite his constant yearning to meet her again, Silver couldn't come up with anything to say. He was speaking incoherent nonsense looking like a fool.

The girl smiled at her former junior as he seemed to be tripping on his words but understood what he was trying to say. "It's good to see you too Silvester, I know it's been a while since we've seen each other, but our reunion will have to wait." Silver was obviously too happy to see here because he didn't mind at all when she called him by his real name.

Bianca drew her twin guns and aimed them at the frozen structure. Silver smiled as he watched her approach the ice prison. Ghost walked up to Silver but went completely unnoticed by his friend who was staring at his half-sister.

"Dude, that's my sister," he said snapping Silver out of it. Silver was scared by Ghost's sudden closeness and thought he lived up to his name at that moment.

Their talk was short lived as the Alpha made its escape. With its newly required semblance, the Alpha activated Shields but not the usual way Cerise does it where she creates an sphere around herself. Instead of creating spherical force field, the Alpha created a force field right along the surface of its body like it was encased in a thin transparent membrane. It was shaping the force field differently and as the recurring theme of their semblances being taken, Violet guessed that Cerise couldn't do this.

The membrane of shield released the Alpha from being frozen in place then it expanded to its more familiar sphere form that destroyed the ice as it expanded. The Alpha was no longer frozen but still trapped in the structure of ice but not for too long as it teleported out of there leaving nothing but an empty husk of ice.

"Uh... can he do that?" Ghost asked aloud.

"I think he just did," Silver commented.

Everyone looked around for the Alpha, but the only one who saw it was Violet. She pointed it out on the rooftop of a nearby building and they were all prepared to try and capture it again but the robot activated Invisibility and disappeared.

 _"Dammit, it saw me use my semblance too,"_ Violet thought blaming herself for its escape and losing their chance to find Remus.

Everyone there except for Ghost, Bianca, and Cerise were beyond exhausted from the battle. If the Alpha didn't leave on its own volition, the battle might've ended horribly. Silver was tired but he used whatever time he had to speak to Bianca. "So Bianc-" he turned to speak to her but saw that she left to be by Ghost and Blood's side.

"We have to report this to Lady Clair, she'll want to have a full briefing of what transpired here. According to her schedule she should be overseeing the Reconstruction project." Bianca opened her scroll to do what she just said. Even though she was free from the chaotic grip of Greyhound, she was still the iron-willed focused person he remembered and he grinned knowing she was working somewhere at a much better place.

Zelts walked to Violet and placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder. She looked at him with a very concerned look. He could tell she was very upset but mostly worried. Before she could say anything Zelts said what she needed to hear.

"Everything will be fine, we'll definitely find Remus and bring him home," he said and this time she spoke before he could continue.

"Zelts, he- it had his semblance. They fought and...Remus is too hurt to fight and... what if Remus didn't just lose but he's also-"

"You, me, and Silver; no one knows him better than us and we know that it'll take more than a super-powered robot and a few broken bones to kill him. If anything, that thing was running away from Remus and accidentally came here with its tail between its legs." His words did make Violet feel a little bit better about the situation.

"I'm sorry, I used my semblance. If I didn't, then maybe it wouldn't have gotten away," Cerise said as she approached Violet and Zelts with her head held low. She waited for ridicule from her seniors, but got a light flick to her head that lifted it until she was looking at Violet's grin.

"Don't apologize for anything Cerise. You helped us out a lot in the fight, in fact this might've turned ugly without you. It's obvious that you gotten a lot stronger, I'm very proud of you." her words warmed Cerise's heart. The thirteen year old girl's was flushed from receiving praise from the person she admired the most. She was proud she transformed herself from fan girl to huntress.

Cerise went back to Celes. VRSZ weren't feeling to great right now, they did their best to fend off the second Remus but they were left feeling tired and having more questions than answers. However, that may begin to change as Blood came to Violet.

"I know a lot has happened today and I'm sure you want to rest but I think I might have something you'd want to know," he said. Violet looked at him to continue. "It's not concrete, but I think I might be able to figure out where that fake is going and that might also lead you to Remus." When she heard him say this it was like she got an energy boost. She quickly moved into his personal space.

"Where! Where is he! Where is Remus! Tell me!" she shouted right in Blood's ear and he pushed her back a little.

Zelts watched the spectacle as Silver walked to his side. "Was she like this when I was in Never-End?" he asked keeping his eyes on her.

"Kind of, I mean she went searching for you and we destroyed an illegal fighting ring and hundreds of people died in the process. So far this is pretty tame," Silver answered as he looked up to the sky to see that the night has come without them knowing.

"I thinks it's best if I tell you tomorrow," Blood said but that didn't sit well with Violet.

"WHY!" she shouted frustrated. Blood looked at Violet and her teammates and could tell they were done for the day.

"Because that battle really tired everyone out and you know it. If you make any rash decisions it'll do nothing but harm your team and ruin your chances of finding Remus." His words rang true as Violet calmed down a bit. "First thing tomorrow, come to Lady Clair's office and I'll tell you what I found out. Until then, get some rest. I know I'll need it." Blood walked away leaving Team VRSZ alone in the already abandoned street before they went home to recover.

 **Setting: Facility**

The moon was shining in the night as Amilius waited outside the Facility building for Alpha. The Facility was a building hidden well in the vacant forest and looked similar to a very large bunker on the outside but had many rooms that served many roles on the inside. The Alpha arrived using Gravity to fly back and land in front of the Facility. Amilius looked at his masterpiece with pride.

"As always you produce such phenomenal results. You received not just one but three new semblances in one fight. And you used them better than the original wielders, another expectation met. You are proving my theory right, soon you will fight the Delta, kill the Delta, then begin Project: New World," he said to the Alpha but the robot didn't respond at all to his words or his presence. "Back to the laboratory, I need you in standby mode to inspect your injuries. A few dings, dents, and some scratches here and there, I can take care of that."

Amilius walked back into the Facility with the Alpha following behind him.

 **Setting : Facility**

Lupa heard their footsteps outside her door. She focused on adding the finishing touches to Velocitas Eradico even though there were still several cracks running through it, but it seemed more usable than before. "All I need to do now is add the upgrade and-" she said to herself but stopped when he ear turned to the chamber behind her.

She turned to the chamber and heard her Delta, Remus, cough and open his amber eye while the vacant socket remained closed. She moved quickly to drain the chamber of the healing liquid and grabbed a large blanket to wrap around him.

 _"He's finally awake,"_ she thought relived and happy.

* * *

 **Additional Information**

 **Bianca has undergone training to be a part of Clair's task force with Ghost supervising her. Her natural talent and her appreciation for Clair's generosity gave Bianca high marks in every area of the training program, even the advanced classes. She completed the training in record breaking time and was stationed as one of Clair's personal attendees, the same as Ghost and Blood. Her personality has recovered after her break from Greyhound only now she is devoted to Clair so much so that she actually scolds Ghost and Blood when she thinks they're slacking.**

 **Cerise went back home and told her teammates what happened to her today. They were surprised by what they were told and glad Cerise was praised for getting stronger. Sapphire asked about Ghost but didn't get much from Cerise. She developed a little crush on him after the Greyhound incident but has been one-sided so far. He has nothing against her but she reminds him a little of Turquoise in appearance unsettling him.**

 **There is a little comedic love triangle: Sapphire has a crush on Ghost who doesn't notice much, Sapphire's favorite VRSZ member is Remus who Ghost is a little afraid of after their first meeting, and Remus likes both of them equally.**

 **I'm still avoiding the fourth volume of RWBY and I'm dying inside. I want to watch them so bad, all I need is a plot for VRSZ volume 4 and I can watch it.**


	5. Mother

**Setting: Facility**

Remus' vision was slightly hazy and his head felt fuzzy. When the blurriness ended he looked in front of him but noticed the vision on his right side was gone. He placed his hand over his right eye but felt nothing there. He remembered what happened before he lost consciousness, the Alpha pinned him down and cut his eye out. The memory burned in his head caused Remus to clutch his head in pain and frustration and he was breathing erratically. Remus was close to hyperventilating. Seeing his suffering, Lupa quickly wrapped a blanket and tried to calm her charge.

"Remus calm down! Slow your breathing! Everything's fine."

When he seemed more unruffled Remus looked at Lupa thinking she was a figment created by Hazel's Pandemonium again. That changed when she placed her hand on his head and rubbed it affectionately. He looked at her face and saw she held no disdain, but loving warmth. This seemed to be worse in his opinion, she was the real Lupa which caused Remus' eye to get tearful, shocking the wolf faunus.

"Wh-what's wrong?!" Lupa had no idea know what brought this on. She didn't know what to do, comforting someone when they're crying was not part of her job description but she had to do what was best for Remus.

"I'm sorry doctor! I failed as the Delta! You made me to be the best but I keep losing! I've been losing so many times out there that it's frustrating! I hate it so much! I made friends and we got stronger together, but it wasn't enough, I still lost fights and, and..." Remus spoke very quickly as he let out all the pent up feelings he had to the person whose opinion means the most to him. "I'm a failure, I admitted it before but that's exactly what I am, a failure."

Remus dropped his head in shame with tears streaming down his face. Lupa got up and walked over to her desk, grabbed something, then walked back to the boy. Expecting to get reprimanded in some way, Remus closed his eye and waited for punishment but felt a thumb wiping the tears away from his eye then something wrap around his head. He opened his eye and saw Lupa wrapping some gauze around the side of his head to cover his eye socket.

"That's better, how's your arm?" she said soothingly. Remus looked at his both his arms and moved them to see if there was something wrong with them but found nothing. It was then he realized what she meant, his arms were fine, _both_ his arms were fine. His broken arm was completely healed and all the pain and wounds he had felt before were gone except for his missing eye. He turned around to see the thing that explained it all, the healing chamber. It has been quite a long time since he's been in there.

"I'm sorry but your eye was too...damaged to be saved so I had to remove it." She tried to explain but Remus was quick on the uptake. He was upset that he lost the fight but he was more upset that there will be a permanent reminder of it for the rest of his life.

"Put your clothes back on and come along," Lupa said getting off the floor. "It's nighttime and you haven't eaten anything in two days, let's get you something." Remus followed obediently still feeling like he failed her.

"I'm sorry," he said but Lupa told him he didn't need to apologize for anything.

A couple minutes later the two were in the Facility's cafeteria eating food in silence for the first few minutes before Lupa initiated the conversation with something Remus said earlier that intrigued her greatly. "Remus, earlier you said you made friends. Is that true?"

Remus nodded and swallowed some food before answering. "Yeah I did. I mean...you told to try and make some when I left and I did. It took a two months after leaving to make friends but I did it and we formed team VRSZ," he said feeling a little hesitant to tell her anything out of fear of being scolded.

"Team VRSZ? You formed your own team? Does that mean you are enrolled in an academy? Wait, VRSZ isn't a color, what does it mean?" The more he told her, the more she wanted to listen. She was like a mother wanting to know everything he has done since leaving her side. Lupa had nothing but questions for Remus and her enthusiasm reached the boy and he seemed more incline to open up.

"We're not affiliated with any academy. We're work for hire but not mercenaries, we prefer to think of Team VRSZ as freelancers, it sounds more professional. Oh, and people always ask this, VRSZ is for color versus colour, the two different ways you say it. It does confuse a lot of people the first time they hear it but we did the best with what we had." Remus was more positive when he spoke about his friends, Lupa took note of that as she continued.

"Your friends, the other members of VRSZ, what are they like?" She asked and Remus smiled, something Lupa has never seen him do.

"Violet is the coolest person I've ever met! She's the leader of our team and the best fighter in my opinion, even better than me. She can beat anyone and scares a lot of our enemies but she's also very nice, she let us all stay at her place before it blew up and now we live in another house. Violet helps me learn new things and so do the others. Silver is another member, he acts like he doesn't like us, but he likes us the most, well he likes Bianca a lot too. She's his friend from an old gang that tried to kill us by blowing us up and taking over our town, but we won. Oh and there's Zelts who likes to keep all of us safe. He is super strong, all three of us fought him and still couldn't win. Turns out he's a gladiator from a bad place that we destroyed not too long ago and..." he was remembering when he lost to Lily then to Chrome which left his body in tatters before Lupa healed him. "-and, I lost couple times in there," he said in a low tone but he kept his mood happy for Lupa.

She was lost on some of the things he said but understood that Remus made friends, good friends and it made her so happy to see Remus happy, to show any form of emotion. She remembered he used to always have a blank expression and didn't talk unless she ordered him. He finally had what she wanted him to have, free will. They forgot about hunger and continued their talk, more like Remus talked and Lupa listened contently. He told her everything that happened to him when he went to Fortuna; the people he met, the opponents he fought, the friends he made, the things he learned, and the adventures he had. She took note of how he always went back to his three friends and how amazing they are. So much so that she already had their names memorized. Lupa wanted this to continue, but she glanced at the clock above the door and realized it's already passed midnight.

"It's late, time for you to get some rest," she said getting up from the table.

"Do I have to?" he asked pouting a little. He was also a little defiant instead of being blindly obedient, something that made her proud.

"Yes, despite being unconscious and in the healing chamber, your mind and body needs rest."

Remus wasn't all that pleased with sleeping anymore than he already had but he trusted Lupa more than anyone else in Remnant. They both left the cafeteria and walked down the hall side by side. She was taking him to his former room. When they walked and she opened the door, she instantly regretted it. When the door opened, there was a layer of dust over everything, not that there was much to begin with. All that was in the bleach white room was a bed, a closet, and a door leading to the bathroom. No accessories, decorations, or any indication that someone lived in this room, it was blank and expressionless, but it didn't seem to bother Remus as he walked in and sat on the bed.

"I'll wipe away all the dust then go to bed," Remus said flashing her a smile. She lifted the corners of her mouth and respected his wish as she took her leave.

Instead of going to her quarters, Lupa returned to her laboratory to continue her work on Velocitas Eradico. So far she did her best to repair as much as she could but failed to add the new feature she wanted, so she planned to pull an all-nighter. The upgrade to the sword would take more than one day, but if she worked non-stop now, it will reduce the time later. When she made it to her desk, Lupa noticed Remus' scroll on the side of her desk. She picked it up and saw that there was no lock or any form of security, giving her complete access to his device and to his contacts. She saw and gazed at the numbers of his teammates for several seconds before she stuffed the scroll into her lab coat's pocket.

 _"If worse comes to worse, at least I'll have a miracle in my pocket,"_ she thought to herself. She went back to work on Velocitas Eradico, hoping to give Remus the literal edge he needed to win.

Remus slept in his bed feeling like he was back home. Team VRSZ slept in their beds, each eager to bring their youngest member back home with them.


	6. Coming Miracles

**Setting: Facility**

It was a new day in the world of Remnant. It was morning but the sun had yet to come into sight in the sky. In the facility Lupa woke up feeling very stiff in her back and neck. Taking in her surroundings she realized she fell asleep at her desk while trying to work on Velocitas Eradico. Sleeping in a chair wasn't the most comfortable thing but she fell asleep none the less.

"The modifications...they're almost done...a few more hours..." she said out loud between yawns. Lupa almost leaned back into her chair to get some more sleep but stopped when she heard someone knocking at her door. She grumbled in annoyance, stretched her arms, then walked to the door.

 _"Knocking? Amilius usually just barges in whenever he feels like it. He must be in a happy mood,"_ she thought pushing the correct buttons on the keypad to open the door. The door slid open and she was astonished to see Remus instead of her colleague standing on the other side. He looked at her with a small smile, but what surprised her was the fact he came here on his own. She remembered before he left how he had to stay in his room unless she told him otherwise, and even then, he couldn't leave her side. This new behavior was refreshing but concerned Lupa, she was worried that even though he was becoming his own person, he wouldn't listen to her anymore, especially about his fight with the Alpha, but more importantly, the secret she's keeping from him.

"Y-yes Remus? What are you doing up so early?" It was clear to her that Remus has not only become his own person but also a morning person, he looked much better than she did right now.

"It's time for training, you always have me train at this time. I'm ready," he said cheerfully.

 _"He still remembers,"_ she thought both astounded and happy. "All right, we can have training sessions again. You can show me what you've learned while you were gone Remus."

 _"And show me if you can stand up to the Alpha,"_ she thought to herself, but realized something.

" Oh right, Velocitas Eradico is still in repair so... I still have a few practice swords you used before I made Velocitas Eradico, that could work. Is that okay with you?" she asked loving this new back and forth they developed. Remus nodded as they went to the weapon vault.

They made it to the vault and Lupa went inside to search for a sword. Passing all types of assorted weaponry, she found what she was looking for, an ordinary longsword that was so out of place with the more advanced armaments in the vault. She picked it up and looked at it fondly of the memories at first then frowned because of them. Not wanting to keep Remus waiting she walked back to the entrance where she saw Amilius staring down at Remus who didn't seem fazed by the glowering. She didn't what was about to happen or what to do.

"...Delta, you're moving again," Amilius said with a great degree of resentment.

"Hello Doctor Amilius, it is good to see you again," he said with a smile, not catching the dislike in his voice earlier. Even if he did, he remembered long ago that Lupa told him to be respectful when talking to Amilius. On the other side of the conversation, Amilius sucked his teeth, not enjoying the pleasantness of Remus' character even after his defeat.

"Humph," the older man scuffed.

"Why are you here Amilius?" Lupa asked a little hostile.

"I heard some noise and thought there was some kind of vermin crawling around. Now I see understand it's just a loose experiment," he said in a very insulting way that made Lupa mad. She knew he never liked Remus and he made sure to express that dislike whenever the boy was around but she wasn't having it today.

"If you'll excuse us, we're going to the training area," she said quickly grabbing Remus' hand and marched past Amilius.

"Hehehe, trying to get some last minute training in? Do you think that'll help him win against my Alpha? He'll lose like he did before, Delta is a failure just like all of your other subjects." he said making his insults clear. Lupa wanted to lash out but did not want to give him the satisfaction of knowing he got under her skin so she kept walking. However, Remus stopped walking and turned to Amilius. This time his face seemed slightly more serious.

"Dr. Amilius, I lost a bunch of times when I left here. I lost and it upsets me every time i think about it because each lost meant I was further away from my purpose, the purpose Lupa gave me, to be the one that starts the New World initiative. That's why I'll get stronger, strong enough to go toe-to-toe with Alpha and strong enough to lead the New World initiative, whatever it may be. That's why I won't lose again," Remus said with a smile that showed his determination.

"... We'll see how long you can keep up that attitude after my Alpha takes you down a second time."

The doctor left to return to his own laboratory. Lupa thought she could do nothing but be amazed by Remus every time he did something new. She was proud of him, but at the same time she thought of herself as the most evil person in the world, for what she did to him and what she originally planned to do with him if he didn't leave the first time. So lost in thought, Lupa didn't register Remus standing right in front of her.

"Dr. Lupa, are we still going to the training grounds?" he asked, knocking her out of her inner turmoil.

"A-ah, uh right. Show me what you can do."

 **Setting: Concordia**

A few more hours passed and the sun was finally peeking through the horizon, signaling many in Fortuna that it was time to wake up. One of these denizens was none other than the Lady of Fortuna herself Clair de Lune Vantablack as she rose from her bed. Admired by all for her kindness, devotion, and protection, Clair has been put on a pedestal by her loving citizens for her years as sovereign and has accumulated many rumors about herself. A particular one was the rumor of her being an eternal beauty, someone who looked gorgeous all the time in any circumstance. That rumor was false.

Clair arose from her bed with out of control bed head that created bangs that covered her eyes. She sat up from her bed, stretched her arms as far as they could go, and let out a long yawn. With both hands she parted her hair to show her sparkling green eyes that have been rumored to see into a person's heart. That rumor was also untrue, Clair is just good at reading people.

She pulled her hair back and it changed from a scruffy mess to a black waterfall cascading down to her bed. She looked more like how she usually looked albeit being in a night gown. Feeling awake enough to move, she got out of bed and slipped her feet into slippers as she walked into her bathroom to do her daily routine then to her walk-in closet to find something to wear. Seeing as how she was going to be outside dealing with the sun for most of the day, Clair decided to wear white shorts that were meant to be business casual and she paired it with a matching sleeveless white shirt that had buttons. She completed her look with a black suit jacket that paled in comparison to her own black hair and wore black casual business shoes because her schedule planned for her to do a lot of walking. She put on her crescent moon-shaped earrings and walked from her closet to her bedroom door.

Clair never wanted to be far from work so she brought her home to Concordia. She had a bedroom made in the building space next to her office. The bedroom was separated by a kitchen then a hallway leading down to a large door that opened up to the office. She left her bedroom and was in the kitchen where Bianca was setting down a cup of tea on the marble table for her employer before grabbing a clipboard.

"Here's your tea Lady Clair," she said formally.

Clair sat down and took a sip of tea and let out a sigh of delight. "So good! You know how to make tea Bianca."

"Thank you Lady Clair," Bianca said respectfully but Clair pouted.

"I wish you spoke to me with a more familiar tone, it makes me sound so unapproachable. You're part of my attendees just like Blood and your brother, and we're friends. You can be casual with me."

"As your friend I want to keep you safe and in top condition so a certain level of profession is needed. This is all for you, my friend," Bianca said standing next to her. Clair enjoyed her devotion but thought she was being a bit too much. She noted how Bianca took over some of Ghost's roles, though his work was being divided by both Bianca and Ghost now that she had more capable people working for her, Bianca was just the most earnest.

Finishing her tea, Clair got up and proceeded to her office with Bianca walking by her side. The attendee told Clair all the things she was scheduled to do today. Clair was already aware so she was just getting a review, but one thing came up that wasn't in her memory.

"I'm sorry, repeat that last one again."

"You have an appointment waiting for you right now. This was last minute but it was very urgent," Bianca answered.

Clair walked through the door to her office then went to the office's main door to see her appointment in the hall. She saw Violet standing right in front of the door tapping her foot impatiently. Behind her was Silver and Zelts both trying to stay awake, well Zelts was, he was leaning against the wall to keep himself on his feet while Silver was sitting on the floor half asleep with a little bit of drool sliding down his face.

"How attractive," Bianca commented seeing Silver, who woke up from hearing her voice. He tried to look cool but wasn't fooling anyone.

Clair smirked from his attempt to be suave then focused on Violet. "An early riser, are we Wallflower? What takes such priority that you and your boy toys need to converse with me?" she asked walking to her desk to sit down as everyone else followed.

"What did she call us?" Silver whispered to Zelts who was still a little sleepy so he didn't respond.

"Blood said he may have a good general idea of where to find Remus. He said to speak with you about it," Violet said getting right to the point.

"That's good news and I know how worried you all have been about young Remus, myself included. So I won't waste any time, Blood will escort you to the location and guide you in the right direction, however, that is all he can do for you. Blood, Bianca, and Ghost have a special covert assignment today that is too crucial for any of them to miss."

Clair looked at Bianca, signaling her to contact Blood. On the other side of the window, a blur zipped through descending to the ground. Everyone already guessed it was Blood answering the call. "Godspeed Team VRSZ. I hope you find your missing friend." Clair concluded there discussion by being a bit theatrical.

Violet's serious face changed to one that was more thankful. She thanked her friend before leaving, feeling like this was an opportunity they can't afford to miss. As they rode the elevator to Concordia's ground floor, Silver texted Bianca on his scroll what the covert mission was. Bianca replied back that it was classified so he was out of the loop. Even though he got his friend back, he felt like they weren't getting closer. He shook those feelings away so he could focus more on what comes first, finding Remus. Outside the building was Blood with a task force car. It wasn't a truck like the one VRSZ borrowed when they searched for Zelts. It was a car that was built for pursuit, able to hold five passengers comfortably. Blood was already in the car looking at them with the window down.

"Get in."

 **Setting: Desert**

Blood drove the car through the desert at fast speeds. With the sandy terrain as his road, the ride was a little dangerous but no one in the vehicle was complaining. Everyone was silent as they made it to their destination. Violet was the first to get out, followed by her teammates then Blood. Blood pointed her to the spot he found evidence of a battle.

"Over there is where I found clues that might lead to Remus. It's not concrete but it's the only lead I could find. When the fake was flying to Fortuna he was moving in a straight line till he made it to the town. If it only moved in a linear fashion, then it came from its destination, meaning if you want to find it then keep moving north, hi... I mean, its hiding place is probably there." Blood informed Violet who took in all the information.

"Thank you Blood," she said keeping her eyes north. Blood walked back to the car.

"If you need a ride call Lady Clair on your scroll, she'll send for you. Violet, that fake, that thing, it's dangerous. Be careful but, more importantly, come back in one piece," Blood said before getting in his car.

Violet turned to him and nodded, promising to do just that and bring Remus back too. Blood drove back to Fortuna leaving Team VRSZ to do their work. She looked at the landscape around her and noticed that they were very north of Vacuo. The desert terrain changed to grasslands then woods further up.

"You guys ready?" Violet asked but got no response.

"...Guys," she called out but still nothing.

"...Guys?" she said turning to see they were behind her but staring at the ground.

"What are you guys doing?" she asked but didn't receive an immediate reply.

"It's... the grass," Zelts said like it was the greatest thing in the world.

"What about it?" she asked confused.

"It's just... we've been in the desert for so long I just... I almost forgotten what grass looked like," Silver answered as he went down on one knee to feel it. This behavior was peculiar, even for them.

"Are you freaking serious? It's just grass. You guys haven't seen grass before?" This didn't seem like the time for this nonsense.

"I have, but we've lived in the desert for a very, very long time with nothing but sand. Grass is a nice change of pace," Zelts answered said with a small smile.

"And I used to live in Atlas which is snow, ice, and more snow. To me grass is a rarity, a precious gift, but I can enjoy it later. Remus does come first and when we get him back, I'll teach him to enjoy the magnificence of grass," Silver joked but Violet understood the sentiment. They began to move to the spot Blood told them about.

 **Setting: Facility**

Lupa was in a room where she was looking out a large window that gave her a perfect view of the training grounds. On the field was Remus battling a large number of Atlesian droids, but they were different from the standard issue ones Atlas produced, they were modified with different weapons, more armor, and seemed more battle intelligent. Either way, Remus was fighting them all and winning, but he had some difficulty.

Remus was feeling the pressure as this wasn't his first battle, he's been fighting for several hours but if he was tired, it didn't show in his appearance. With his eye gone, he had to pivot and constantly turn to cover up his blind spot and prevent enemies from sneaking up on him. He was also taking a few hits every now and then, but the flow of battle was completely in his favor. He didn't have his favored weapon but that didn't stop him from slicing and cutting down any robot that got in his way. After bisecting a robot, there were three left in his way.

Two droids with spears charged at Remus but it didn't scare him. In fact, they reminded him of Chrome and his weapon so he was more than eager to take them down. He ran toward them until he was between them then jumped up and used both legs to kick each robot in the head, throwing them off balance. Remus quickly dealt with one by impaling it through the chest then sliced it half before moving to the other one. He performed several quick swings and the robot's weapons and appendages fell to the ground.

All that was left was one droid that didn't wield a weapon. Remus moved in and right when he was in front of the robot it reeled its arm back and threw a fist at him but Remus pulled a feint by teleporting behind its back. He was about to land a strike until the robot reacted faster than he expected by lifting its leg and kicking him in the gut. Remus was pushed a few feet away before recomposing himself and landing on his feet. The droid turned around to face him then got into a fighting stance.

 _"Hand-to-hand combat model and an improved version too. Without my railgun I can't end this in an instant,"_

He moved in for close combat and was going toe-to-toe until the droid landed a punch strong enough to knock the sword out of his hand. Remus didn't want to let up so he switched to fighting hand-to-hand as well. It was still even as the droid hit with punches and Remus used palm strikes. When the robot threw one more punch, Remus blocked it with his palm then grabbed hold of the robot. He pulled it forward to throw it off balance, then he hit it hard in the face plate with a kick, knocking it back a few feet.

Lupa watched from the viewing area with worry. Not because this droid was taking longer for him to defeat, but because she noticed something about Remus' fighting style and abilities.

" _He's definitely gotten weaker,"_ she thought in realization. _"It's true that this isn't the same Remus before he left but his strength has decreased dramatically. He was much better, much sharper before but now... Is this because I made him leave? If he fights like he fought before then he had a chance but... Did exploring the possibilities in life diminish his battle prowess?"_ She reached for Remus' scroll in her lab coat pocket.

"Can he beat Alpha?" she said aloud hoping someone would cast away her doubt.

She took his scroll and looked through the contacts till she found Violet. She was pondering if now's the time to call his team and hope for that miracle. Her thoughts were disturbed when she heard something hard pound against the glass. It was Remus with his feet on the glass, he kicked off and started moving around the training grounds. He wasn't as fast as before but he was still moving fast enough that Lupa and the droid were beginning to lose track.

 _"You remind me of him,"_ Remus thought as he ran around the area.

The robot fought with no weapon which made him think of Blood, someone Remus really wanted a rematch with. The idea of facing Blood again got his blood boiling with joy. He also thought about Lily, someone else he promised to fight again and his own teammates, the people he wants to continue to fight alongside.

"There are still others out there that expect me to be stronger! That's why I can't lose anymore!" he shouted as he ran by his sword and picked it off the ground.

As he ran around the training ground, he dragged the tip of the sword along the ground, creating sparks and a ear-churning noise that greatly upset Lupa, but alerted the droid of Remus and helped him keep track of where he was going. Remus ran straight for the droid, jumped in the air with the momentum from running and was about to land another cut. The robot timed its attack accordingly and was about to punch Remus hard in the face. Before the mechanical fist, inches away from his face, could land a hit, Remus teleported and the smoke expanded and surrounded the entire training ground. The fog was thick and the droid didn't know where Remus was.

Before it could do anything, the longsword was hurled at it, directly from above. The weapon pierced its head, going three-quarters of the way through its body, and the droid was offline. From above where Remus threw the weapon, he fell to where the defeated droid was and landed on the large hilt of the weapon. His added weight caused the blade to press down all the way through the droid, completely destroying it with Remus squatting on the weapon with a triumphant smile. He jumped off, pulled the sword from the robot's corpse, then held it in reverse grip and held a victory pose. Lupa had come to another realization, this wasn't the same Remus she once knew and that works to his advantage.

 _"When I thought about Remus and Alpha fighting I look back to the Remus I created and not liking his chances. But now, this new Remus that has grown in his own unique way...he isn't as strong as he was when he was with me, but that doesn't mean anything. He's been growing and changing just like his fighting skills, that fog of smoke he used was just amazing, even when he used it on Alpha. His cleverness has improved, he's unpredictable, and his techniques have diversified,"_ she thought content. This new change in Remus could be seen as a miracle too.

Lupa pressed a button on the wall to turn on the intercom to speak with Remus. "Good job Remus, you did exceptionally well," she said sounding cheerful. Remus smiled himself feeling proud that he impressed her. "We're going to the cafeteria, you need some food after a battle like that and you've been fighting for hours."

The two merrily walked down to the cafeteria feeling pretty good about the training sessions. They made it to the door, but it opened from the other side and Amilius appeared, creating the same situation they were all in earlier. Amilius studied their behavior, they were much more positive than the last time he saw them which disappointed him. Remus looked at Amilius with no contempt in his eyes but he was more happy with himself but Lupa, on the other, hand looked at him with disdain, still remembering what he said a few hours ago. Before either one could say anything to the other, an alarm went off that sounded throughout the Facility. The two scientist recognized what this alarm meant, but Remus didn't.

"What's going on?" he asked Lupa.

"It's just a safety drill," she said as the alarm was going off. "Go and get something to eat, Dr. Amilius and I have to check on something," she lied in a sweet motherly tone that made Remus smile before he went inside the cafeteria. Lupa dropped the kind act and she went to the security room with Amilius who eyed her as they walked.

"What purpose do you have coddling your Delta? I told you emotions will bring nothing but ruin," he lectured her like he always does.

"They have been scientifically proven to also bring forth unexpected results and Remus is an excellent example. I'll admit I was worried about him at first, but after seeing how much he has developed on his own, Remus might give you a run for your money Umbra." She was confident in her words and Remus.

"Let's keep it professional, you don't hear me call you Niveus do you? Beside,s my Alpha has few surprises of its own," he retorted not pleased with her current attitude.

 _"I'd rather you call me by my first name again. It reminds of the good old days before you buried yourself in this project and rivalry,"_ she thought to herself wishing her old friend would come back but he seemed gone forever.

They made it to the security room where the screen showed it detected trespassers. Amilius was about to press the button on the keyboard that displayed what the security cameras found until he got a notification from the computer in his glasses. It was enough to stop his current action as he moved his hand to his glasses to see what this was about.

"I have to go, the Alpha finished recovering, it takes priority over whatever this is. It's most likely some Grimm wandering around just ignore them and they'll go away," Amilius said as he left the room, but stopped at the door pondering something. "Give me your opinion on improving my Alpha, what do think of giving it artificial intelligence?"

"An A.I.? Hasn't that been done to death?" she said not liking the idea for many reasons. Amilius nodded in agreement then left.

Lupa proceeded to finish the action her colleague was about to do and pressed the button to reveal who or what set off the alarm. She was completely shocked at what she saw, Team VRSZ, Remus' team was here. She couldn't be more fortunate that Amilius left the room, but now she had no idea what to do next.

 _"They've only seen Alpha swiftly take Remus away and they still found this place, well, close to finding this place. Quite a resourceful group of friends you have Remus, perhaps resourceful enough to defeat the Alpha or better yet, show Amilius that emotions and humans can bring about great change, that way there'd be no need for fighting,"_ she thought as she watched them on the monitor. She pulled out Remus' scroll and contemplated what her next move would be.

 _"They'll find this place eventually if they're already here. Their mission is obviously to find Remus and anyone else involved will most likely be viewed as an enemy... the best course of action for me is to appear as an ally,"_ she thought as she opened Remus' scroll knowing what course of action to take.

* * *

 **Additional Information**

 **This was mentioned near the end of Volume Two but I want to bring it up again. Umbra Amilius' name is Latin and roughly translates to 'Dark Rival.' Niveus Lupa's name is also Latin and roughly translates to 'Snow Wolf.'**


	7. Confession

**Setting: Forest**

Team VRSZ scanned the area and like Blood concluded, there was a battle here. Silver looked at the fallen trees, Zelts took note that they were only living things in this forest, and Violet stared worriedly at the dried blood splattered on the ground.

 _"This is Remus' blood, that robot fake can't bleed so it has to be-"_ her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of her scroll going off. It was the noise she heard whenever she received a text message. Unlocking her scroll, Violet's eyes widened as she saw the name of the person texting her.

"Remus?" she said aloud and it caught the attention of her teammates. She couldn't believe after all their searching, Remus would just send them a text.

" Are you freaking kidding me?! It's been three days and he decides to text us now? I'm gonna kill him," Silver said both a little angry but mostly relieved.

"What does it say?" Zelts asked walking up to Violet.

She read the text aloud. "This is not Remus but I know you are here searching for him. I can lead you to him" They all felt a little unsure what to do with this information.

"It's obviously a trap. Someone knows we're here and are trying to get rid of us," Silver said underwhelmed by the text.

"I'm not so sure of that, if they wanted us to leave they would've waited to see if we'd leave on our own rather than tell us they're here," Zelts retorted.

"If whoever's contacting us has Remus's phone, then they're in leagued with the flying metal death trap that is Remus 2.0!" Silver said. As usual, Silver and Zelts were playing devil's advocate and it would come down to Violet to make the final decision.

Lupa was unintentionally eavesdropping on their conversation with her surveillance devices watching the entire forest. She understood their hesitance since they were right about Alpha being more dangerous than they know.

"Not only did that wannabe take Remus, but it came back for more and tried to kill us. So far in terms of trust, the people behind this are 0 for 2...and they stole our semblances, that's 0 for 3!" Silver complained.

Lupa was shocked to learn about this. She was unaware that Amilius sent Alpha to attack them, making them less trustworthy of her, but she had no choice but to help them get to the Facility. She would worry about the small details when they arrived.

While they still argued, Lupa sent them another text:

"Walk north, in approximately 256 meters is a building hidden in the densest part of the forest. Remus is here,"Violet read the text aloud.

"That's quite a walk. I still say it's a trap," Silver griped wanting to voice his opinion.

"I think we should go for it. Violet, no matter what we say the final word is always yours. What's our move?" Zelts said.

"...We've been looking for Remus for so long and his location was just literally put right into our hands. We can't let this opportunity slip, but like Silver said, this is too convenient for it not to be a trap. We'll go there but watch our backs, understood?" she said facing her boys. They nodded and followed their leader to the Facility.

 **Setting: Facility**

Lupa let go of her breath feeling relieved now that Team VRSZ was listening to her texts. However she wasn't sure what to do once they got here.

 _"Amilius has placed all his attention on Alpha meaning he'll be shut in his lab all day. But that'll leave me dealing with their anger over Remus being taken,"_ she thought then her shoulders slumped.

She knew what she had to do even if it meant that VRSZ would attack her, Lupa had to tell them the truth, the very truth that she refused to tell Remus out of fear of what he'll do once he learns his true origins. Lupa quickly walked to the cafeteria where she saw Remus finishing the last of his food. Chewing on her lower lip, Lupa walked over to Remus' table with a false smile on her face. "Remus, how are you feeling?" she asked kindly.

"Like I could go another round," he responded feeling pretty good about himself.

Lupa thought this would be easier than expected. "That's good to know. If you want, you can go back to the training grounds and battle some more, just keep the difficulty at a reasonable level. I have some work in my lab that I must attend to so take as long as you need okay?"

The boy agreed and made his way back to the training grounds while Lupa did what she said she would about working in her lab. She knew it would take Team VRSZ some time to reach the Facility and she knew Remus and Amilius would be too occupied with their own things to notice their arrival. Using this free time to cover for every contingency, Lupa added the finishing touches to Velocitas Eradico's improvement but that was all she could do. The fragility of the sword meant the weapon was on its last legs and would probably last for one more fight.

It took VRSZ quite some time to make it to the dense part of the forest and a little more time to locate the Facility due to it being very hidden well. During this time, Remus was still at the training grounds, Amilius was locked up in his lab making repairs and adjustments to the Alpha, and Lupa was walking to the front entrance. She moved to open the door, but when her hand reached out to open the door for her guests she stopped. Her hand was trembling from fear, fear of what would happen once she does this. What will transpire? What are the consequences? Will this be for better or worse? Whatever happened after this, it all falls on her, everything that happens will be her fault.

Lupa opened the door by pressing the code into the keypad. The door slid open but no one was on the other side. _"Given their location when I gave them the directions they should've been here by now. They're late,"_ she thought as walked to the door and tried to peek through to see if she could see them coming.

Out of nowhere, Lupa was hit hard in the chest by some unseen force. It pushed her all the way back into the wall of the building then she felt something on her throat limited her air supply. Walking through the door was Silver with Ceasefire in both hands ready to fire at anyone and Zelts with the Wings of Icarus. Her body slowly coming into view, Violet deactivated Invisibility, showing that she had her arm pressed against Lupa's throat. If fear was any indication of strength, then Violet would be the strongest person alive in Lupa's eyes.

"Where. Is. My Remus," Violet said in a threatening tone.

"I know why you're here. I'm the one who texted you," Lupa said as she slowly reached in her lab coat pocket to show them Remus' scroll. Violet eyed the device and could already confirm that it's her friend's scroll, but her suspicion didn't let up.

"Please trust me, I want to protect Remus too. His well being is the most important thing to me," she said hoping her words could reach the younger girl.

Violet continued to hold Lupa by the throat, but she eventually loosened her grip but held a harsh glare. "For your sake you better be right," Violet threatened. She never played when lives of her teammates were at risk.

Lupa silently guided them to her laboratory where she planned to explain everything. When they made it in, all of Team VRSZ saw was a lab with a large monitor, some kind of pod, a door, a and a large desk with their teammate's weapon laying on top of it. The fact that his sword was here didn't comfort them because it wasn't with its wielder.

"He isn't here," Zelts stated looking around the room.

"He's currently in the Facility's training room, I promise you'll see him soon." Lupa hoped hearing of his safety that would please them for now.

"Then what are we here for?" Silver asked confused.

"Because one way or another, this may be the last time I ever see Remus and I want someone to know the truth about him... and I also want to confess my sins, the inhumane things my colleague and I have done," Lupa said looking very downcast before looking at Team VRSZ.

"What have you done? What the hell is this place and why does it involve my friend?" Violet asked trying to keep her cool the best she could.

"This is the Facility, a hidden research building that no one in the world knows exist. And the only ones that run it is my colleague, Umbra Amilius, and myself, Niveus Lupa, two scientist with one goal; to help the world find a way to reach a better state. We decided to call this goal Project: New World. I guess in order to tell Remus' story properly I have to tell mine."

"Umbra and I are both from Atlas. He was a scientist tasked with improving Atlesian droids and creating new designs and weapons for the possible future. I was also a scientist tasked with learning about the human body in order to learn its capacities and how to integrate machinery and dust into it to improve its potential."

"During my research I came to a realization; there is no improving, no outside source that can better people. Their potential is limitless, but also nearly impossible to tap into. I wanted to start a new branch that focused on doing just that, however, the higher-ups of Atlas constantly rejected my pitch and I was l close to giving up altogether, but Ami- I mean Umbra approached me. He told me that a few of his ideas were rejected as well and we started talking about them, my human potentiality and his more experimental robots. During that time I gained a friend."

"Whenever we talked about our ideals we got into a fictional competition about whose plan was better, but eventually Umbra got more... sensitive about our non-existent rivalry and decided to make it a reality. After a few years, he actually built the Facility with his own accumulated money and decided to be an independent researcher in order to fulfill his dream. He offered me the chance to finally get my research started, but I had to cut all ties to Atlas. I had the chance to make my dream come true and do it with the person I respect and cherish, I accepted his offer in a heartbeat and we began Project: New World."

"As the years past, we both continued with our own research. Umbr- uh, I mean Dr. Amilius, he spent nearly all his time creating new robots and droids that try to fit his idea of perfection, but each one failed to meet his outrageous standards so he kept making more. I on the other hand was having difficulty finding willing participants to be test subjects. Tapping into a person's innermost potential is extremely difficult and unfortunately my...methods put an enormous strain on the body that all of my subjects died in the process. Neither of us were showing any positive results, but Amilius' research was showing better progress than mine and his bitterness towards his failure was being directed toward me. I don't know when, but the passionate man I first met was replaced with someone so fixated on his goal that it overtook everything."

"He made several robots that he gave certain names starting with Beta, then Gamma, Delta, and so forth. I did the same and gave my three test subjects code-names; Alpha, Beta, and Gamma. Amilius was preserving the name Alpha for the one that would be perfection," Lupa explained lengthily to the three members of VRSZ.

"So what, he created the Alpha and it looks like Remus 2.0 because what? It's some kind of jab at being better than the original?" Silver asked.

"...N...no, Alpha is special...very different from anything else that Amilius ever made," she said hesitantly like speaking about this physically hurt her.

"How so?" Zelts asked. Violet continued to stare daggers at her with an angry face. She's been doing this throughout the whole story.

"Because before he was called the Alpha, his name was Romulus Cobalt... and he was Remus' older brother."

 **Next Chapter: Chapter 8: The Cobalt Brothers Part 1**

* * *

 **Additional Information**

 **Fair Warning: The next two chapters will be about Remus' past so there is little to no action in them.**

 **It is an understood rule that messing with her boys will bring about Violet's wrath.**

 **Ghost, Blood, and Bianca are strong fighters, but they all have the same opinion about one thing; They could never stand up to Clair de Lune Vantablack. She is a kind person and boss that they have a difficult time disagreeing with because she goes above and beyond for her people and that is especially true when it comes to her employees. When Ghost was sick, she sent him home as she fed him, tended to his needs, and left a servant to do whatever he wanted even though it made him very uncomfortable. One time Zelts got something caught in his throat and coughed in Clair's presence. She sent him home on paid leave and he doesn't even work for her.**


	8. The Cobalt Brothers Part 1

**Setting: Facility**

"The kid has a brother, the kid has a brother!" Silver shouted not believing what Lupa just told them. He wasn't the only one, Violet and Zelts were having a hard time processing this news as well. Even the steely gaze Violet had was broken when she heard Remus had an older sibling. Seeing their paused faces made Lupa feel worse but she intended to tell them everything while she could.

"Yes, Remus had an older brother named Romulus. Both of them became part of our research, but I should explain who they were before coming to the Facility, the past of the real Remus."

"What do you mean real Remus?" Zelts asked not getting what she meant.

"So the Remus we know is a robot, just a very human-like one?" Silver asked hoping to finally end this bet between him and Zelts. Seeing him try to squeeze in his theory about Remus being a robot really pissed Zelts off. He didn't think this wasn't the time or place.

"No he's the same Remus, 100% human, but just not the same child I met the first time," she answered.

"Son of bitch," Silver mumbled under his breath giving Zelts fifty Lien now that their bet was settled once and for all.

"Seven years ago, there was an ordinary village where ordinary people lived. They weren't affiliated with any kingdoms so they were very vulnerable to the Grimm attacks, but it wasn't much of an issue for them. In that village lived a family that protected the villagers, they were known as the Cobalt family."

When Lupa talked about the Cobalt family, Violet remembered what Blood told her the first time they met:

 _"I came from a no-name town in the middle of nowhere, not much happened there except for Grimm stalking around our doorsteps, keeping us prisoners in our own homes. We lived isolated in darkness for a very long time. However, a small light was able to pierce through the darkness. A small family bared arms against the Grimm and helped keep the peace, the Cobalt family, a line of warriors who inspired the people of my home, myself included."_

 _"I guess she's telling the truth so far,"_ Violet thought as she paid close attention to Lupa's story.

"One fateful day, a colossal horde of Grimm came out of nowhere. They destroyed everything and killed everyone, except two boys who were able to escape the bloodshed. A thirteen year old named Romulus with his eight year old brother Remus. For two months the brothers have been looking for food and shelter only to fail, that is, until I found them. Children with no one watching them or care about their existence were the perfect people to be our test subjects so I approached them. Romulus told me their story and I made a deal with him, I offered them sanctuary in the Facility in exchange for being participants in our research."

"You really are a twisted woman. Taking advantage of two boys for your own selfish gain," Violet commented, truly disgusted. Lupa had a small sad smile on her face.

"Yes I was, I am. At that time I only thought of my research and finding a suitable subject that could help it progress. I thought I found that in Romulus, but Amilius forcibly took him under his wing as an assistant to help create more machines while I was left with Remus, who at the time I didn't think amounted to anything and at first that seemed to be the case."

"Remus wasn't the same person we know today. His personality was the complete opposite of what it is now. Back then he was easily frightened, pessimistic, and had no aptitude for combat what so ever." When Lupa said this she went to her desk and found a keyboard.

Using the device, the monitor turned on and displayed recorded footage of Remus, a much younger one that looked terrified with a sword in his trembling hands. He was fighting some unarmed Atlesian droids, but couldn't muster the courage to fight. One approached him and with one punch it knocked him out.

Team VRSZ looked at this feeling very uncomfortable. This was their friend when he was so young, forced to fight when he clearly didn't want to. Silver didn't want to look anymore, Zelts felt like Remus was in the same situation he was in when he was in Never-End, Violet's heart went out to him and her anger flared. The person that did this to him was right in front of her.

"In five years, Romulus helped Amulius create robots designed to surpass humanity, but they still did not meet Amulius' vision. I taught Remus combat using methods found around the world and how to survive, but he had no talent for battle and all my efforts seemed fruitless. With every new robot Amilius was getting closer and closer to completing his research while I remained in the same place I've been for years. Back then I saw Remus as nothing more than a test subject and I never cared for his feelings or pleas and it only got worse as he proved to be more useless compared to my last three. I believed his tragic past was holding him back and realized Amulius' advantage was that his machines had something Remus didn't, a clean slate."

"So... I did something that will forever be my greatest sin," Lupa said with her eyes focused on the other door in the lab. VRSZ looked over there as well and noticed how it brought some emotions out of the wolf faunus.

Violet was the first to move, she walked to the door and pushed it open. Lupa gasped wanting to stop her, but she knew it had to be done. Violet walked in but stop after taking three steps from the door, something in there stunned her. Silver and Zelts walked to her side and Lupa slowly followed behind them. The other two members saw what made their leader stop in her tracks.

The room wasn't as large as the laboratory but it could hold about four people. The place was covered in dust, most likely from neglect as it was quite evident that no one has been in here for a long time, but the real attention grabbers were the objects in the room. Along the wall was a small desk with a large computer on top of it and in the middle of the room was some kind of surgical table with metal cuffs for arms, legs, and one for the neck. The thing that terrified VRSZ was the large menacing looking device above the head of the table, it looked like some kind of needle with a magnifying glass at the tip. This room looked like it belonged to a mad doctor that did horrendous experiments for their own amusement.

"What the hell is this place?" Violet asked trying to sound tough but was bordering on horrified.

"This is... this is where the Remus you know was born." Lupa choked on her own words as certain emotions began to rise. Thinking about the memory alone was bringing tears to her eyes.

"I wanted to start fresh but I couldn't get rid of Remus because Romulus wouldn't allow it. Even during training he would stop it midway if he thought Remus was in any kind of danger. So instead of finding a fifth experiment, I decided to literally start over with Remus. One night I had him sedated and brought him here where I... I used this surgical laser to perform a certain surgical procedure; to remove the memory of his past trauma. But it did more than that, it took away all of his memory and most of his common knowledge. That's when he became my Delta and the person you know now."

Silver and Zelts were too staggered to do or say anything, but Violet was thinking about everything she said. She imagined Remus strapped to the table against his will, the laser firing. Just now she realized this was how Remus got that long precise scar running across the right side of his head and why he was lacking in knowledge like a newborn infant.

"You lobotomized him!" Violet shouted grabbing one of her two daggers. "You took a child and lobotomized him!"

She walked to Lupa ready to maim her, but Zelts kept her from the faunus by holding his leader back with his arm. Violet struggled to get through, but Zelts wouldn't budge. Even as he held her back, he also understood how she felt and he was doing his best to stay calm. Silver was the same, he had both hands on Ceasefire's holsters ready to shoot everything but restrained himself. Violet stopped her rash action and looked at the woman with hate in her eyes.

" I hate you, I hate you for everything you did to him," Violet said in a dark tone. Lupa understood and was willing to accept all of her hatred.

Before anyone could say anything else, they heard the door slide open. Lupa was the closest to the door and already saw who entered her lab. Remus looked around and found Lupa at the other door. "Dr. Lupa, I finished training, but I went too hard and broke the sword, my bad," he said hoping for forgiveness.

Upon hearing his voice, the members of VRSZ exploded out of the room to finally see their teammate after such a long time and after hearing such a story. Remus blinked when he saw his team and smiled. "Hey guys! What are you doing here?" he asked then received a tight embrace from Violet which was followed by Zelts placing his hand on Remus' shoulder and Silver standing by him with a grin.

Violet had her head resting on his other shoulder then noticed the bandages wrapped around his head and right eye. She withdrew from her hug to get a good look at him. "Remus did you get hurt?" she asked and saw his face fall.

"Uh- I fought Alpha and..."

He unwrapped the bandages to show his friends he was missing an eye. Violet was so shocked she had to take a few steps back with her hands covering her mouth as tears formed. Zelts' hand fell lifelessly to his side and all the color in his face went away. Silver actually fell backwards from the horror and he was breathing erratically. Violet turned to Lupa with tears falling, this time she was really going to mutilate her. Blaming the scientist for everything, Violet charged at her with the intent to kill, but Remus teleported and stood in her way. She stopped in her tracks confused at his action and his resolute expression.

"Why are you defending her?!" she asked more harshly than she wanted to with him.

"Why are you attacking Dr. Lupa?!" he asked and hearing him address this woman in a respectful tone angered her more, but she didn't want to direct it at Remus.

"Why wouldn't I? She's the one who taught me everything, the very first person I've ever met, and I trust her a lot," he said standing before Violet but didn't like the confrontation at all. Opposing Violet did not sit well with him but he didn't understand why she was about to attack Lupa.

Hearing him praise her like that sent Violet over the edge. This woman molded him into a puppet and Violet was ready to cut the strings. "None of that is true! She took away so much from you and Romulus, your brother!" she said, but Remus looked confused.

"Brother? What's that? And what's a Romulus?" Remus asked tilting his head in confusion.

"Oh god," Silver said under his breath looking away exasperated.

Zelts couldn't think of anything to say, but he looked at Violet to see what she'd do next. And he was right as he moved in behind her just as she was about to move Remus aside to kill Lupa and restrain her by holding her back with both his arms. Lupa accepted all her anger and disdain because it was all true and no excuses could be made.

"You bitch!" Violet cursed in a white hot rage. "Tell him! Tell him everything!" she shouted, terrifying both Lupa and Remus despite being lifted in the air by Zelts.

Lupa wiped the tears from her face and looked to Remus who looked back at her with confusion. It reminded her of all the times he had questions about simple things and she was more than pleased to help answer his questions, but this time was different. She had no idea how he will respond, but with Violet baring down on her she had no choice in the matter.

"Remus... the- there's something I have to tell you."

* * *

 **Additional Information**

 **Remus Cobalt was inspired and named after the myth of Romulus & Remus, twin brothers who founded the city of Rome. Amilius Umbra is based on Amilius, the twins' uncle that seizes power and has the brothers abandoned to die in order to rule. Niveus Lupa is based on the she-wolf that finds and raises them. Both play similar roles in this story.**

 **In a very literal sense, Remus was raised by a wolf, a wolf-faunus but still a very similar scenario.**

 **In the myth of Rome's creation, Romulus and Remus were arguing about the location of where their new city should be built until Romulus decides to kill Remus and name it Rome, after himself.**


	9. The Cobalt Brothers Part 2

**Setting: Amilius's Laboratory**

Amilius was in his lab looking at his fully restored Alpha in standby mode. It was laying on a scanning table and on a nearby monitor it displayed the robots status. It was fully functioning and ready for battle once again. He smiled now that repairs were complete.

"My Alpha, you will be the closest thing to perfection this world has ever seen. Once you begin Project: New World, your power will continue to grow and grow until nothing can stop you," he said aloud as if the Alpha could respond. "Despite my own genius, I truly have you to thank for this Romulus. None of this would've been possible without your natural talent which is why your contribution will never be forgotten. A fellow scientist who gave everything to pursue his goal."

 **Setting: Lupa's Laboratory**

"And that's when you became the Delta," Lupa said telling Remus everything she told VRSZ up till now.

His face was hard to read, but throughout the story it changed from shock to horror to a many number of negative emotions and at the end he was just silent. He tried to say something but didn't know what to say. A few moments ago he thought he was raised by Lupa and trained to fight in order to begin Project: New World, now he knows his life was much more than that. He had a brother who loved him greatly, he had a family, a home in a village before it was destroyed by Grimm, he actually hated fighting and was terrible at it, and Lupa wiped his memory as a form of reboot so he would be her ideal Delta.

All of this hit him like a truck and he lowered his head till he was looking right at the floor. Remus' body was shaking a little and everyone noticed. This was the worst day of Lupa's life because she was the one who brought this out of him. She moved in to comfort the boy, but he reeled back not wanting to be touched by her. He back stepped until he was next to Violet who looked at her with anger. Violet seemed like a be a better choice than Lupa right now.

"Remus, there's nothing for me to say, but I'm sorry. Back then I was so fixated on making my research a success that I was willing to sacrifice anything to attain it, even you and I'm sorry," she said but Remus didn't budge.

"What I did was terrible," she continued to apologize as she went to her computer and opened some old video files. "And as a result you became my greatest creation and as time passed, your physical abilities skyrocketed past your previous limits in one week and each time you battled you only improved. My theories of unlimited potential were proven right when you began to break past the average limits of human speed." She played the videos showing a young Remus fighting droids in the training grounds.

He was merciless in the battles, he slaughtered every droid and Grimm in his path with extreme prejudice, and his eyes had that intensity that Team VRSZ saw now and then. Each video showed his battle prowess evolving drastically. Silver was extremely impressed that Remus has been this strong, Zelts looked at the video then back at Remus to confirm it was the same person because they were so different, Violet watched in silence while Remus looked and had one thought in his head, _"I used to be that strong?"_

"Feeling confident in his abilities, I challenged Amilius and Romulus' creations. I had Remus battle several droids, the first was Amilius' Delta to prove a point. Remus destroyed him with ease and my colleague was beginning to feel nervous while Romulus felt pride in his younger brother. The next battles were against Zeta, Gamma, Theta, and Eta as two more years passed."

Old footage played of Remus fighting these machines and he did so with little effort, but his face remained blank, completely static and unchanged. He was like a doll only doing what he was told and nothing more which disturbed the others.

"Yes, you're all right to respond that way, Romulus felt the same. Because of the attention to detail and work effort Amilius passed down to him, Romulus didn't get to see his brother as much as he would've liked but he entrusted Remus onto me. However once he started noticing the smallest of changes, he grew suspicious and met his younger brother to put his doubts aside, but instead, he found out that the baby brother he once knew was gone forever."

"My operation worked too well, like I said before, it was intended to only remove his memory of home and family being killed, but it did much more than that. It affected all his memories and not the way this works in fiction where he eventually remembers everything, the procedure didn't suppress his memory, it destroyed them completely, they're never going to return, Remus I can't say this enough, I'm sorry," Lupa said to her experiment, but the boy didn't move from behind Violet. It was like he was waiting to hear everything or enough information to make a decision.

"What I did created a ripple effect within the Facility. Amilius grew jealous that the progress of my work brought his back to zero, Romulus was threatening to take Remus and leave the Facility altogether. I wasn't concerned with him because I knew Remus would follow my every order, but what I didn't count on was the rage inside Amilius. He began to berate Remus whenever he could just to feel better about himself, but not knowing he was being insulted, Remus never reacted the way he wanted. One night, Romulus was finally ready to leave. He told Amilius who reminded him of the deal he made but Romulus continued to leave anyway, except Amilius took extreme measures. He activated his remaining to droids, Beta and Epsilon, and gave them a single directive, kill Romulus, an order they completed to the letter."

"So your friend, a fellow sociopath, designed Alpha to look like Romulus because what? He helped him make robots and doing this was some kind of gift? If so then he sucks at gifts," Silver said adding his dislike for what's been going on in this building.

"If only that were true, Amilius didn't make another robot after killing Romulus, he used Romulus' body as the foundation for his next creation, a cyborg that became his greatest work which he named the Alpha, the only thing that remains of Romulus." Lupa's revelation was the thing that disturbed Team VRSZ the most. Lupa saw no reason to stop talking so she continued.

"If you're wondering how that's possible, then I'll explain it to you. Before Amilius left Atlas, he was part of a secret project, one that involved taking the aura of someone and storing it into someone or something else. The project was tested on a robot disguised as a young girl, but Amilius thought he could do better and used Romulus as the catalyst. He made a cyborg out of his body which was able to not only retain his original aura but his semblance as well which is the key to Alpha's success."

"I would've guessed it was Checkpoint like Remus, but after fighting him I have a pretty good idea what it is," Silver said.

"Yes, throughout his time here I thought the same. Romulus was able to use the same semblance as Remus but better, I assumed it was a hereditary semblance, those are rare but still possible. Amilius learned what it really was when he dissected Romulus and told me all about it when he showed us Alpha. The original name is unknown, but Amilius named it Upgrade, a semblance that not only copies another person's semblance, but uses it a level higher than the original user."

"So it's a 'Anything you can do, I can do better' scenario? Perfect," Silver complained.

"Yes, but it does have weaknesses, apparently Romulus could only copy a semblance that it can see, this was passed on to the Alpha as well. Another weakness is that Upgrade can only copy one semblance at the same time, so fighting it in a group is essential, however, Amilius used his engineering to improve it. Upgraded semblances are temporary, but his brain is now a super computer that stores the data of semblances it has copied, now it can use those upgraded semblances anytime it wants, but it still can only use one at a time, however that may change. Amilius is constantly improving Alpha so using semblances simultaneously won't be that far behind."

 _"I feel like if we fight this thing again, we're screwed,"_ Silver thought dishearteningly.

"It all started that day, when Amilius presented the Alpha to us proclaiming, his victory and I was horrified with what he did. I protested against this as an inhumane act against the victim's will, but he asked how what he did was any different from what I did to Remus. I couldn't say anything, he was right, two years passed since I did that to him and the consequences never occurred to me, not even Romulus' earlier objections bothered me, but I finally acknowledged the error of my ways. I wasn't the same but I killed Remus, the former one, all for what? For my desire of finding out how to bring out a person's latent potential. At that moment, Remus was with me and he looked to his former brother with no emotion or reaction at all. It was what he said next changed me completely."

 _"Who is that?" the soulless Remus asked Lupa._

"Amilius was ready to pit the robotic Romulus against his zombie-like brother, but I couldn't let this continue anymore. Two days later, I brought Remus to the Facility's entrance where I gave him one last order, the thing Romulus wanted for him; To live his life happily and make friends, I didn't want him to come back to this place where all of these lives were ruined. He left but Amilius was aware. He said it didn't concern him but if he ever found Remus again, he would have him fight Alph- Romulus to the death."

Lupa finally concluded her story. She looked at Team VRSZ to see their reaction after a lengthy story, especially Remus, who remained unreadable.

"I don't know what happened to you out there, but you were close to dying Remus, you probably didn't know this but the Delta symbol on your back begins to flash when you are near death. It sends a distress signal to my lab, it was just bad luck that Amilius witnessed it too," she said while the other members of VRSZ added their input on what she told them.

"I already said I hate you right? If not, then let me say it again, I hate you, from the bottom of my heart I truly hate you," Violet said to the wolf faunus. She didn't what else to say to get to her point.

"This is why I hate Atlas, just because you can do something doesn't mean you should," Silver said venting his frustration with his old home. He blamed Atlas' constant need to grow power for affecting the two scientists.

Zelts let go a huge sigh and looked to Remus who remained stoic until he finally lifted his head. Lupa expected a verbal tongue-lashing from her former experiment, but what he did next was out of the ordinary even for him. Remus went to grab Velocitas Eradico and its sheath from the table then hastily left the room to who knows where.

"Remus!" Violet and Lupa said at the same time but he didn't answer either of them.

"Where is he going?" Violet demanded from Lupa as Silver and Zelts went to chase after their friend but when they made it to the hallway all they saw was a puff of smoke then at the end of the long hallway, was their friends shadow turning left.

"I don't know, the only other places he could go is the cafeteria, the training grounds, the armory, the droid storage room, and- oh no," she said figuring out where he was going.

 **Setting: Hallway**

Remus was speed walking down the hallway like a man on a mission. His face was scrunched up and his eyes flared with anger. He was experiencing a new emotion he never felt before in his life, hatred. His body felt like it was on fire and it only felt hotter as he got closer to his target which was a door. Remus gripped the hilt of his sword.

 **Setting: Amilius' Laboratory**

Amilius looked at Alpha from behind the glass. It was stationed between the two droids that survived all this time, Beta and Epsilon, orange and light blue respectively. Both looked like Atlesian droids, but obviously improved with new armor and adjustments. Beta was equipped with blasters for hands and Epsilon didn't seem to possess any visible weapons. Amilius himself was on his computer already planning his next move after the battle.

"The Alpha will be the most powerful thing on the planet. As time passes and it gains more power as it fights and kills more huntsmen and show Remnant that the only way to secure the world's future is to advance the development of technology. The belief that humans can bring forth any kind of miracle is just that, a belief, a bedtime story told to people of all ages just so they can sleep soundly at night. Alpha, you will wake them from their slumber with your power and bring about the great change Remnant has been waiting for." he said as if the Alpha could talk back.

"It'll take some time before that happens so until then you must continue to gather semblances, I programmed you to contain the data file of hundreds of semblances and that will continue to increase, but first we must find you suitable participants who can provide you with valuable semblances. A good location would be an academy where fresh students try and die to become the new heroes that save the world. We have quite a selection... let's chooooose this one, Beacon Academy. After you kill Delta this place is next on our to-do list," Amilius said full of himself.

Suddenly, he heard something attacking his door. He turned around only to see it get sliced in half. As it fell, he saw the only obstacle left in the way of his new world, Remus.

"Did Lupa forget to feed you? What do you want with me Delta?" Amilius said turning back to his work on his computer, but he was activating the one is his glasses putting commands for his three machines.

"My brother, Romulus, you killed him and turned him into the Alpha," Remus stated with angry eyes. Amilius looked back at Remus when he mention his brother.

"Hmm, so you were finally told about your brother. I was beginning to wonder how dense a person could be when the truth was in front of them the entire time," Amilius insulted. "What do you plan to do now?"

"I'm going to destroy Alpha, so Romulus can finally rest in peace and end Project: New World for good. I'm not letting you have your way," he said with tremendous determination in his heart.

"You've gotten rather rebellious Delta. Lupa may encourage such behavior, but I have no tolerance for it. Perhaps you need to be disciplined, maybe I need to put out your other eye so you'll know your place."

Beta and Epsilon were activated, busted through their respective capsules, and lunged for Remus who drew his sword ready for battle.

* * *

 **Additional Information**

 **Remus' theme is Hold on to You by NateWantsToBattle and his theme is meant to be different from his teammates. The theme songs of the other VRSZ members have lyrics meant to help describe their personality, their dreams, and how they identify themselves. The lyrics of Remus' theme song is actually being said by Romulus after he learned what Lupa did to his brother.** **It's a message to Remus, he's begging, pleading for Remus to remember him, but to no avail and realizes that they are just pawns in two people's rivalry and it's all his fault. Romulus wants Remus to know even if he doesn't remember him if something like this happens to him(Alpha) and he doesn't remember, the time they spent together will never disappear. Now they are both gone and just shells of what's left.**

 **Remus' symbol flashes whenever his life is in danger. This could be seen as a reference to a health bar in videos games where it flashes to indicate that it's low.**

 **Project: New World was a plan implemented by Niveus Lupa and Umbra Amilius to create the perfect being and present it to the world as a way to change life for the better. Neither scientist made this a reality; Amilius' goal changed from peace to domination while Lupa realized the error of her ways and dropped the project completely.**

 **Remus was told he was supposed to be the perfect being so losing was seen as a failure in his mind which is where he gets his extreme dislike for losing fights. Also battling machines had a side-effect of him generally disliking all types of robots.**


	10. The Delta

**Setting: The Facility**

An explosion rang throughout the Facility. Remus was forced to run out of Amilius' lab as laser blasts were being fired on him, but he dodged each one. As he ran down the hall, Beta Orange was right behind him, flying through the air using the thrusters on its back. Lifting its arms, it fired more laser blasts at Remus. Covering its body were small octagon-shaped plates, once Beta opened one on its left shoulder, another laser was found and fired on Remus only to miss. Behind them was Epsilon Blue marching to the battle while Amilius remained in his lab like nothing happened. He was getting the Alpha out of standby mode and as he did it's amber eyes glowed a crimson red.

Silver and Zelts were following Remus down the hall but weren't fast enough to keep him in their sights. As they continued to follow their friend, they began to hear the sound of blaster being fired. "Oh great, what the hell did he do?" Silver complained.

"Let's give him the benefit of the doubt. He's angry but it can't be that bad, I mean it's Remus after all," Zelts said defending his friend who he saw turn the corner and crash right into them causing them to fall into a heap of tangled limbs.

"Why Remus, wh-" Silver groaned but his question was answer in the form of Beta flying past the corner then fired on them.

Remus quickly teleported to them at end of the hallway where they all got up.

"What is that?!" Silver asked. Beta released several plates from its body and they hovered in the air like Hazel's wasp drones. They fired more lasers in a swarm, causing the boys to flee further down the Facility all the way back from whence they came with the drones and Beta in hot pursuit.

Back in Lupa's lab, Violet was about to leave the scientist to find her boys but was stopped by Lupa as soon as she reached the open door. "The hell do you want?" she asked darkly. After everything Lupa told her about what she did to her teammate, Violet didn't have the most positive view of the faunus.

"I already know you hate me, but I also know you care for Remus deeply. I brought you all here because I believe together you can get out of here safely and I told you his tale because no matter what happens today, this will be the last time I see him. He probably wants nothing to do with me now."

"You're damn right this is the last time you see him, I'll never let you anywhere near Remus again."

"Good, I'm glad you feel that way because I'm entrusting him to you, Violet. Keep him safe, be his friend, and make sure he lives a happy life like Romulus always wished for him. As long as that wish is fulfilled, you'll never see me again and perhaps I can find some peace, even if Remus hates me forever," Lupa said with a sad smile. She was willing to atone for everything she's done.

Violet looked at her for a moment before turning back to the entrance to leave. She was about to enter the hallway, but stopped when the bumbling force of her boys barreled through followed by laser fire. _"Of course those boys do something stupid when I'm not around,"_ she thought using two fingers to squeeze the bridge of her nose in frustration.

In the hall the boys were running away from the laser fire. Silver and Remus were dodging them while Zelts did the same, but because he wasn't as fast, most of the laser blast tried to hit him which is why he used Conversion to absorb the attacks. Tired of running, Silver turned around, grabbed Ceasefire and fired several rounds at the flying drones. He was able to shoot down several of them and he fired on Beta too. The attack had an impact on the robot as it faltered in its flight path. Silver aimed for its face plate and broke through and destroyed the left optic causing the robot fly off course. It skidded against the wall before Zelts jumped in its way and bashed it with his shield. His assault caused Beta to smash into the front door of the Facility and break through where it crash landed into the ground.

"Yes!" Silver cheered victorious, but that moment ended quickly when they heard Epsilon Blue's heavy footsteps. "Oh come on."

Violet entered the hallway and through two magazines full of dust to Silver. He caught them and looked to her for instructions. "Silver, Zelts, go take care of the orange one outside. You guys can hold your own. Remus and I can deal with this one," Violet said doing her job as their leader.

"Got it," Zelts said walking down to the entrance.

"You're the boss, boss," Silver said replacing his normal rounds with the dust rounds.

Violet eyed Epsilon up and down. _"It doesn't look so tough."_ she thought but that ended when the sound of multiple buzzing was being emitted from the robot.

The robot removed the armor on its arms and underneath were countless chainsaw blades completely covering both its arms. Lifting the armor from its abdomen revealed the same, it was a safe assumption that its entire body was covered in blades.

"Oh son of a bitch," Violet cursed under her breath.

Lupa walked into the hallway but stopped just at the entrance of her lab. She didn't want to get in the way of the battle. She noticed that Remus tried to shift his sword into its railgun form, but the extensive damage it received prevented it from changing from its current state despite the slight repairs she administered. Seeing how his action was futile, Remus decided to sprint past Violet toward Epsilon and attack with his blade. The chains on the robot's torso began to whirl, moving at high speed and creating more noise. When Remus' sword struck the robot's body, the chainsaw blades stopped the attack from cutting through and the clashing created sparks that flew all around the hallway.

Remus had to keep his eye closed in order to protect it, but this proved to put him at a disadvantage as Eplison lifted his left arm to bring it to Remus' face and shred it. Violet threw a Vorpal Sword at its arm and it froze instantly, however the chainsaw blades still were able to move inside the ice. Swiftly, Remus landed another hit with his sword by attacking upward, but the chains still stopped the attack, forcing him to turn his head and teleport to Violet's side and the violent rotation of the chains easily shattered the ice on Epsilon's arm.

"Wish I didn't send our better long-ranged fighters away," Violet said throwing two more Vorpal Swords at the machine and they exploded on impact.

When the smoke cleared, Epsilon didn't seemed all that damaged, but it removed all the armor on its body save for its head. Its entire body was encased in chainsaw blades and the unpleasant sound of several motors running made it seem like some kind of horror show. Violet continued using her Vorpal Swords to attack while Remus tried to get his weapon into railgun mode, showing a great deal of anger. Epsilon began moving toward them slowly with a few of the chains blown off or out of place thanks to Violet's constant attacks. Seeing Remus struggling with his weapon, Violet decided the best move to protect him was to face the machine head-on even if it was dangerous for her. She threw three more Vorpal Swords that electrocuted the machine this time then grabbed the twin daggers from their holsters. She swung one which clashed with Epsilon's arm, but the force was too much for the small bladed weapon and Violet was forced to take a few steps back.

 _"Invisibility is probably useless, even if it helps me get close, I can't make a dent with those chains rotating all over its body...Wait-"_ she thought as an idea came to mind.

Lupa looked at Remus struggle in anger and decided to tell him about his weapon. "Remus, I'm sorry but Velocitas Eradico is too damaged to change forms." He grunted in frustration and she understood this was piling on his hatred for her. "But I added something new, put both hands on the grip and twist it," she instructed and he did as she said. When he did, the two edges of the sword began to glow and shine a cobalt shade of blue. Remus could feel the energy of the railgun flowing through the sword.

"I modified it so you could still use the energy. It increases the sharpness of your blade greatly, strong enough to damage the Alph-" she said, but Remus teleported away facing her instead of the battle.

Behind her back, Violet used her semblance to make the dagger in her hand invisible then threw it looking like she was just hitting air. She hit the only place on Epsilon that wasn't surrounded by saws, its head. Violet hit it in the middle of the face-plate and the dagger reappeared stuck in the head then with quick movement, she jumped on top of its head, roughly yanked her dagger from its face, then jumped off with a kick to the back of its head. She was ready for another attack, but a puff of smoke materialized in front of her and all she heard were several slashing movements and a trail of blue light. When the smoke cleared, she saw Remus standing before Epsilon with his mechanical sword glowing on its edges and Epsilon being sliced diagonally all the way through. The machine fell apart and before it did, the arm and legs fell off as well, effectively terminating Epsilon Blue.

 _"He used Checkpoint and teleported to a location outside his line of sight. He's still developing, even in the midst of combat. As a scientist I can theorize that he was close to reaching a new level and made it at this moment, or from a normal point of view, perhaps he was motivated to assist friend,"_ Lupa thought.

Violet looked at the new improvement to Velocitas Eradico then at Remus, who turned around then walked to the entrance to help Silver and Zelts fight Beta Orange. When she looked at his face, she noticed that his eye had that intensity that she saw every now and then when he fought seriously. She did become aware of that this was different than the other times as well, ordinarily, the intensity made his eyes seem clouded, but now she could see his pupil clearly like Remus was still in there.

"Violet, come on, we gotta help Silver and Zelts before Al- I mean Romulus gets here," he said looking at her. She broke out of her daze and led the way to the entrance of the Facility.

"Wait!" they heard someone say. The duo stopped in their tracks and turned to Lupa who looked worriedly at Remus. _"That look in his eye, it's like the Remus I knew has returned,"_

Violet's face scrunched a little in aversion when she looked at the scientist, but Lupa didn't let it discourage her from speaking to Remus who looked at her questioningly.

"I already know you hate me Remus, if someone did all this stuff to me I would hate them too. Forcing you to do all those things for an unattainable goal... Perfection is impossible for anyone and it took hurting you and Romulus to see that. Amilius no, Umbra hasn't realized that and it has corrupted him into someone I don't recognize anymore. I can't speak for Umbra but I want to tell you I'm sorry, I'm sorry for everything I've done to you and for what my former friend did to your brother. I know you'll hate me forever and I also know you'll never forgive me but I want you to know that I'm sorry," she said with her head bowed, waiting to hear Remus agree with her.

"...Why would I hate you?" he asked. Lupa and Violet looked at him completely astonished.

"I mean, you did do a lot of bad things, but you apologized right? And you seemed very sad about what you did. And when you let me go, I did make friends and I have my own life like you and Romulus wanted, so I should be saying thank you. AND I got stronger like you said I would so your theory isn't completely wrong. I think believing in your own capabilities help you get stronger and you can also learn when you lose...ahaha guess it took me a while to figure that out, right?" Remus said with a grin as he rubbed the back of his head.

"Amilius is the one I'm mad at. I don't know who Romulus is, but you said he was someone really close to me and wanted nothing but the best for me. Once this is all over, I'd like to know more about him. Could you tell me later?" he said, looking at her with no negative thoughts whatsoever.

Lupa looked at Remus, her former Delta experiment, with befuddlement then happiness at his growth. Though he diverted greatly from her original course, Remus has proven to be a success. She smiled with tears filling her eyes feeling eternal grateful. Violet's feelings for Lupa didn't change but Remus, the scientist's victim, felt no resentment toward her so for his sake she'll lighten up on Lupa, whenever.

 **Setting: Forest**

Laser fire was being shot around the forest along with the sound of gunfire and blustering winds. As multiple drones flew around, one by one they were being shot out of the sky by Silver using Ceasefire. More were caught up in a windstorm and destroyed by the electrical current within. All that was left was Beta Orange with the plate slots on its body missing the drones. It flew through the air passing trees toward Silver and Zelts.

With the flow of battle on their side, Silver jumped from tree to tree till he was in the path of Beta and once the robot was close enough, he used Gravity to jump and land on the robot's back, riding it like a surfboard. Silver had his fun but quickly used the ice dust in his gun to fire on its back, covering the droid in ice. He jumped off as the droid was falling toward a Conversion-powered Zelts, who used his shield to block the robot. The force of the impact caused Beta to break apart into pieces.

"That was more fun than I thought it'd be," Silver said enjoying himself.

Zelts didn't feel the same, he knew this was the calm before the storm. "We need to regroup with the ot-" then in a puff of smoke Remus appeared between them scaring them both.

"DAAA! REMUS WHERE THE HELL DID YOU COME FROM!" Silver shouted and Remus remained his usual oblivious self.

"I came from inside the Facility. Violet's right there at the entrance, I took a head start by using Checkpoint from inside." Remus answered.

"...I thought you could only teleport from where you could see. How'd you do that?" Silver asked.

Remus shrugged and gave him the only answer he could think of. "I leveled up."

Zelts looked and saw the difference in his eye and smiled. "Yeah, that sounds about right."


	11. VRSZ Romulus: Level Up

**Setting: Amilius' Laboratory**

Amilius sat at his desk watching the battle unfold this whole time from his monitor using the Facility's surveillance devices, including the destruction of Beta Orange and Epsilon Blue. He expected this to happen but he was still vexed about losing his last two robots.

"...I guess it's understandable why failed experiments like those would fall, but they didn't take a single one of the Delta's friends with them. They were obsolete, but they were still my creations... but I digress, time for the main act."

He activated the computer in his glasses. The Alpha began to move from its current position walking to the entrance of the lab. "Alpha Crimson, show them what perfection incarnate looks like," he said to himself and Alpha activated its thrusters and flew through the Facility to meet its targets.

Lupa was still in her lab when Team VRSZ destroyed the last robot. She was skimming through her old notebook where she recorded everything about Remus during his experiment days, but the sound of the Alpha passing through her door tore her focus from the book. She dropped it and moved to her own monitor to watch what was going to happen next.

 **Setting: Outside the Facility**

The team regrouped just in time for the Alpha to land right at the Facility's entrance. The cyborg remained in a neutral position glaring at all of them if it had a conscious. It was awaiting for Amilius to bequeath it a command, but VRSZ wasn't going to give a chance. Violet threw some Vorpal Swords and Silver let loose a few rounds with Ceasefire, but didn't make it in time. Amilius, watching the battle unfold in the comfort of his lab, already used the computer in his glasses to give Alpha its new order: Attack.

The cyborg gripped its glaive, spinning the weapon in his hands to deflect the bullets, however with his newly acquired dust, Silver's attack were much more effective. When his attack hit the Alpha, it froze the glaive and hands, stopping its movement. The Vorpal Swords came in the second wave and the first two exploded on impact then the second one brought out lightning. When the explosion cleared, it showed the Alpha activating Shields to create a dome-shaped barrier to protect itself from the various dust attacks. Remus used Checkpoint to teleport inside the shield, standing right before his brother, but the Alpha teleported away in a red puff of smoke. The shield disappeared but Remus was the only one in there looking for the Alpha.

"Zelts," Violet said and he knew what to do.

Splitting the Wings of Icarus into wingblades, he spun around to create an area sweeping gust. The force ferociously swept up nearby debris and bustled the leaves on the trees, even his own teammates did their best to hold their ground. Violet looked around the area in search of the Alpha. She noticed that some of the flying debris was hitting and brushing against something invisible on a tree trunk. She knew that was where the Alpha was perched. "There! **VRSZ Fantasia**!" she said pointing to the location initiating their improvised team attack.

Silver shot at the base of the tree branch with fire dust and it blew the branch apart. As it and the Alpha, now visible, fell to the ground, Remus teleported behind it and swung his sword to strike but was met with one of the bladed ends of the glaive. Silver ran to Zelts as he reformed his shield and activated Gravity. The gunslinger took hold of Zelts' hoodie, affecting his friend with Gravity to lighten his body, and threw him toward the Alpha and Remus like a grounded **Starfall**.

Remus bared down to keep his brother in place. When he saw Zelts hurdling toward them, he quickly used Checkpoint to get out of the way and back to Silver and Violet's side. Zelts was able to tackle the Alpha in the back, sending them both flying through the forest. However, the Alpha pushed itself off the shield until both its hands were on it, using its thrusters, it pushed against Zelts causing him to stop as the cyborg kept a firm grip on the Wings of Icarus with Zelts holding on as well. Using Gravity as its own, the Alpha made the shield and Zelts heavy as it gracelessly dropped the freelancer down onto the ground creating a crater on impact. Zelts was a little disoriented as the Alpha jetted to him with its glaive ready to run through him.

In a puff of blue smoke, Remus appeared between Zelts and his brother to block the hell-dive with his blade. He quickly jumped to block the move before it got any closer to his fallen comrade and when their weapons met the sound echoed through the forest, a new crack formed on Remus' sword. The struggle was ending in the Alpha's favor, but a Vorpal Sword silently flew through the woods and hit the Alpha, remaining stuck to the side of its face then electrocuted it. Violet's surprise attack distracted the Alpha enough for it to stop its attack and move away from the team. Violet jumped from a tree branch to Remus and Zelts with Silver following behind her. Seeing Zelts get up, she gave him a dozen of her Vorpal Swords.

"Use Conversion, we need you at full strength against Romulus. Remus, you too, full power. Silver keep an eye out for Romulus, try to anticipate his movements while they get ready."

Zelts activated Conversion. His hand glowed gold, draining the dust from the Vorpal Swords. Remus twisted the grip on his sword and it glowed its cobalt hue on the edges which drew Zelts and Silver's attention.

"When did yo-" Silver was about to ask but Violet interrupted him by answering his question with, 'He leveled up.'

"Do you see him?" Violet asked Silver who analyzed the area. His answer was him firing a round of lightning at the Alpha standing farther away from them, but his attempt ended in surprising failure. The Alpha activated Conversion and absorbed the attack fueling his own strength.

"Oh that's just perfect," Zelts complained, seeing his own semblance being copied by Upgrade.

The Alpha fiercely gripped a nearby tree and activated Gravity to make the tree extremely light then it yanked the tree out of the ground with brute force and wielded it like a giant club. Once Gravity did its job, Alpha used the physical boost from Conversion to carry the force of nature while its foes looked astonished.

"Silver can you do that?" Remus asked looking stunned at his brother's feat.

"No..." Silver grumbled in jealousy.

The Alpha lifted the tree overhead to bring it down on VRSZ like a hammer, but using his shield and his own strength boon, Zelts smashed his weapon against the trunk, breaking the end of it. With much of the weight gone, the Alpha was able to wield the tree trunk with less resistance and greater speed and he tried to strike them again, but failed when Remus teleported at the end of the trunk and started attacking it with a flurry of sword strikes. He continued to reduce the size of the tree and the new improvement to his sword made a thin trail of blue light follow his blade's movement which looked dazzling to onlookers. Not missing this opportunity, Violet and Silver dashed to the machine while Remus reduced its weapon to splinters. Before they did anything, Zelts split his shield to wingblades again and unleashed a sweeping wind strike to the Alpha that was quickly catching up to his teammates' backsides. Not looking back, Silver put his right arm around Violet's waist and with Gravity, he jumped in the air with her to perform a back flip, avoiding the gust and letting it hit the machine point-blank. The force of nature pushed the Alpha back a couple feet and it let go of the tree trunk that was now a stump.

The duo continued their dash and **VRSZ Fantasia** by implementing **Thick As Thieves**. Gripping her dual daggers and changing his guns to their escrima form, Violet and Silver engaged the Alpha in close combat but the cyborg proved to be more than capable to hold his own against the joint attack. Glaive in hand, the Alpha met them blow for blow then moved to the offensive as he was beginning to strike harder, faster, and push them back. Silver was the first to take a hit, Violet was next and eventually, they were both hit with an onslaught of blade strikes. **Thick as Thieves** was about to be overtaken until Remus teleported in with Zelts as they tried to strike the Alpha from behind, but it activated Shields, it created a thin membrane of shield along its body to protect itself from their blindside attack then the Alpha quickly expanded the force field to push all the members of VRSZ back.

Everyone tucked and rolled on the ground and the first to get up on their feet was Remus as he teleported back to his brother. With his more developed Checkpoint he was able to teleport anywhere without looking at where he wants to go, but unlike his usual way, he didn't know what was waiting for him on the other side, an appropriate term would be a leap of faith.

Remus appeared in front of his brother and quickly landed a strike on its chest which left a mark on it but Romulus seemed barely effected by the assault as it grabbed its weapon to retaliate. They started a bout and neither side was wavering. Remus' resolve was too strong for him to give in. His speed allowed him to match Romulus, but his brother's machination combined with the strength boost from Conversion meant he lost in terms of strength. Remus even teleported a few feet away, but when he disappeared in a puff of smoke, Romulus did the same a few seconds later and it reappeared much faster than Remus who appeared behind his brother. Romulus succeeded in preemptively striking Remus down to the ground and landed several more hits before Remus teleported away, but Romulus beat him to the point and continued to do this each and every time he teleported to a different location. At times Remus would block his brother's attack and other times he would get hit. Understanding that this was a losing battle he went back to basics and fought Romulus on the ground.

 _"Even after getting on the same level of Checkpoint as you, your Upgrade is still able to take it further. Romulus, you're better than me. There's no getting around it, if we were to fight one on one I would lose. But I'm not alone, just like you wished, I have friends who will back me up whenever I need them,"_ Remus thought and answering his call was Violet appearing out of nowhere with Invisibility.

With both brothers locked in combat, she used this moment to activate Invisibility again, moved to their left side, and stabbed Romulus in the shoulder then followed up by a swift strong kick to her knife, causing it to lodge even deeper into its shoulder and damaging it significantly. Remus continued his assault using the opening Violet made and landed a critical hit. With his new and improved Velocitas Eradico, Remus brought his sword down and it cleaved Romulus' glaive in half, permanently leaving it in dual swords mode and landing another scar down its chest, but a new crack formed around his sword.

 **Setting: Amilius' Laboratory**

Amilius witnessed what Remus just did on his monitor and scowled in anger.

* * *

 **Additional Information**

 **In order for the Alpha to use Romulus' semblance it needed his aura. Amilius used the research from Atlas' aura study to keep Romulus' aura active even though his body died by transferring it into a storage unit then transferring it back into his body once Amilius finished creating the Alpha from his remains. Similar to how Penny is a living machine, but played downed because Amilius didn't give him free will so it's more like Romulus' soul is a prisoner in its former body, forced to watch it fight Remus.**

 **VRSZ Fantasia: A team attack consisting of every member of VRSZ. As the name suggests it is an improvised on the spot incorporation of each member's unique fighting styles that no opponent can predict. Even they have some problems following one another and not crashing into each other because this is a very new team attack but each time VRSZ Fantasia is used they get better at it.**


	12. VRSZ Romulus: I Am Your Omega

**Setting: Amilius' Laboratory**

Amilius wasn't pleased with how Remus landed a critical hit against his supposed perfect creation. Too caught up in his negative thoughts, he failed to notice Lupa enter his lab until she spoke. "You're not going to win this Umbra."

Her words surprised the male scientist as he swiftly turned in his chair to face her. Recomposing himself, Amilius returned to his previous position facing the monitor in an attempt to ignore his former friend. Lupa was dead set on trying to save him from his own ambition and probably end the fighting before something happens.

"Umbra, whether you win or not will amount to nothing. Perfection is unobtainable, it is an ideal that no human can ever achieve."

"That is why technology will do the things we are unable to do! It is prevalent throughout Remnant's history that technological innovation and advancement is the reason humanity has lasted this long. In the past we were a doomed species ready to go extinct were it not for the discovery of dust and the technology created to prolong us, but that won't last forever. In order to create a perfect world, a perfect being must govern it, that is Alpha, it will be the symbol of perfection, I don't care how many lives are lost in the process, the end result is the goal, the goal of Project: New World. Alpha is immortal, it will govern this world long after I'm gone." he said losing patience as he watched Alpha continue to fight VRSZ.

Lupa shook her head in disapproval. "Humans are imperfect, we faunus are no exception, that is something that we always fail to see. And if we're imperfect, so are the things we create, Remus & Romulus, our experiments are the same and it took destroying both of them for me to figure it out. Remus is human, he will always make mistakes, Romulus is now a cyborg monstrosity created by flawed human hands, he is imperfect just like his creator. All technology is imperfect, it is only disguised every time we try to improve and upgrade them, but the difference between humans and machine. Technology needs something to improve it, an outside source, while humans learn internally, band together to create things, amazing things, and the best part is with every failure they learn and grow stronger."

Amilius tried to ignore her short speech and gave various commands to Alpha to turn the tide of the battle. Seeing no change in his behavior, Lupa left her former friend in his lab to continue his hopeless ambition. She realized now the person she once knew as her friend was long gone, forever lost in his desire for perfection. Returning to her lab to safely watch the fight, Lupa continued to look at her monitor and watch the two brothers battle to the end.

 **Setting: Forest**

Reduced to dual swords, the Alpha continued to fight off VRSZ who were still using **VRSZ Fantasia**. Right now, Violet and Remus were pressing it with **Cloak and Dagger** , the duo were doing better than before thanks to Remus' previous attack staggering the machine. They were being assisted by Silver, who was firing normal rounds at the machine now that it acquired Zelts' Conversion, it wasn't doing much, but it proved to be a viable distraction for them and for Zelts who was getting in position.

Violet was invisible as she and Remus attacked the Alpha on all sides. Remus kept its gaze focused on him as he parried attacks while Violet attacked from behind by slashing it with her daggers to throw it off balance. Silver kept shooting it in the optics, but the Alpha's parts were made of a much stronger alloy than Beta Orange and Epsilon Blue, Zelts spun around to create a small tornado to lift him to a tree branch with a better vantage point.

The Alpha parried with Remus once more than delivered a swift kick to his chest, sending him back as the cyborg performed a wide area sweeping motion with his blades to flush out Violet. She was hit by one of the swords and it knocked her to the ground while she was still invisible, but the Alpha already pinpointed where she was and was about to stab her. Silver, feeling a little rash, fired three shots of fire dust at the cyborg hitting its back and setting it on fire, but it activated Conversion to absorb the flames without looking back at him. Silver quickly moved in to save Violet, but he wasn't fast enough as the Alpha was already in motion to skewer her. Never enjoying the thought of being a damsel in distress, Violet raised her dual daggers to make some kind of defense, but a puff of smoke appeared between her and Alpha, signaling that Remus intervened.

Holding his sword's sheath in his right hand, he positioned it right where Romulus' blade would land. When the smoke cleared, Silver saw Remus stand between their leader and the enemy whose sword was blocked by being placed in Remus' sheath. Not wanting to stop his previous action, Silver ran up to the fight, shifted Ceasefire into escrima mode, and with a leap, he got up to Romulus and landed a strong blow to where Violet's knife was lodged, damaging the area more and he used Gravity to reduce gravity's effect on the cyborg. Following up, Remus threw his sheath holding his brother's blade aside and teleported himself and Romulus away into the air, giving Zelts the moment he's been waiting for. Zelts spun himself and his blades around again to cloak himself in wind so he could take to the air, then with another spin, he plummeted straight down right where the two brothers were.

Remus teleported away right before Zelt corkscrewed his brother in the back. The attack brought them both to the ground where Zelts continued to press his tornado down on the Alpha. However all his attack was hitting was the force field created by Shields. Refusing to let up, Zelts condensed his tornado to add more piercing power and the shield began to crack from the assault before he broke through, but the Alpha quickly erected a second one and a third one beneath that. Zelts managed to break through the second one, but he couldn't keep spinning forever and his motion slowed down then ceased before he could penetrate the third shield. The Alpha landed a powerful punch to Zelts' jaw, sending the larger freelancer flying before tumbling onto the ground then slamming into a tree and his aura broke.

Violet quickly moved in to intercept and the Alpha moved through the forest and Violet followed in pursuit, giving Zelts some time to get up. Violet quickly threw Vorpal Swords at the cyborg that stood still and had its hand out to her which she thought meant it was going to create another shield. Her throwing knives almost made it to her target, but suddenly stopped in mid air only an arm's reach away from the Alpha. Befuddled, Violet had no idea what happened until a tree appeared with her knives embedded into it.

 _"His Upgrade evolved my Invisibility. I can't make something that big completely invisible if I tried,"_

She wasn't going to be discouraged by this as she moved in for a close quarters fight now that the Alpha only had one blade left of its weapon. The Alpha closed the distance by teleporting right in front of Violet and performed a downward strike aiming for her skull, but was blocked by Remus' sword. He teleported into the battle with Silver and protected his leader from the surprise attack. Silver took hold of the Alpha's arm, used Gravity to lighten the machine, and threw it further away from them then moved in to attack. Remus was about to join, but was kept aside by Violet who gave him a handful of Vorpal Swords and pointed to Zelts who was on his feet. Remus nodded and teleported to Zelts while Violet fought by Silver's side with their **Thick as Thieves** combination.

Remus appeared by Zelts' side, presenting the Vorpal Swords he needed for a full power Conversion. Zelts graciously took them and absorbed them as quickly as he could in order to help Violet and Silver. The duo were using their team attack to fend off the cyborg, but against an opponent that felt no pain, the Alpha was on a permanent offense that made it difficult for them to land a finishing blow. They were being attacked and having their aura depleted with every strike it hit. However, it wasn't perfect, the only weak spot the Alpha had was the one Violet made with her knife in its shoulder, now just the grip was visible and Silver, being the heel that he was, exploited that weakness non-stop. He banged his escrima sticks hard on Alpha's shoulders causing more damage as Violet fought to draw the machine's attention to the best of her abilities. Their persistence kept them in the fight longer than they would have on their own, but the Alpha still stronger with its collection of semblances backing it up.

Violet tried to land a blow with her daggers, but was met with a small force field in the shape of an actual shield around its arm that pushed her back. Silver retaliated by striking the moment the Alpha deactivated Shields, but it instantly teleported behind Silver in a red puff of smoke and landed a powerful slash with his blade, chipping away the last of his aura. He fell to the ground while the Alpha was ready to stab him in the back but Violet, being the leader that she was, quickly came between the two and blocked the sword with both her daggers. After a long hard battle she was reaching her limit, the Alpha, who had no limits, was pushing her body back with sheer force. Silver, at the end of his rope as well, got up and moved to the Alpha's damaged side, but the cyborg reacted faster than he expected as it grabbed him by the throat. The same action was done to Violet as the Alpha lifted both of them by the throat and off their feet as it did the command Amilius gave it and choke them out, but it looked ahead at a potential danger.

Violet and Silver completed the task of distracting the Alpha long enough for their last card, Zelts fully powered by Conversion and Remus by his side. Swinging both blades with all his might, Zelts let loose the most powerful blast of wind he has ever made and it caused the nearby trees to shake and lean to the direction the wind was blowing. The Alpha continued to hold Violet and Silver while activating Shields to protect it, but the terrifying force of the wind easily broke through the force field, but the cyborg quickly created more than three dozen dome shields between it and Zelts to last against the attack. The wind blast ended and Zelts, with his eyes still glowing gold, saw that his attack destroyed all but nine shields and the tenth one had cracks everywhere.

"Damn," Zelts cursed but Remus stepped up with his improved sword.

" **Delta Storm** , put all the power you have into it," Remus said to Zelts.

They were out of options and the look on Remus' face told Zelts that his teammate was sure about this plan. "Alright, but with all that power you might get torn to shreds inside the tornad-" Zelts said but stopped when his friend looked at him with his intense amber eye. It was all the confirmation he needed to perform the team attack while the Alpha stayed behind his layers of force fields.

Zelts began to rotate both his blades to create a powerful golden wind funnel that Remus jump into. Unlike the usual **Delta Storm** attack they do, this one was filled with powerful electrical currents that through it and Remus was being hit by all of it. His aura broke while he was in the tornado funnel, but his unwavering resolve pushed him to keep going. Following the rotation of the funnel, Remus began to spin with Velocitas Eradico until he and the sword were at the front of the funnel. With his sword leading the windstorm, it served as a lightning rod, drawing all the electricity to the tip, increasing its power immensely. The cobalt blue glow of Remus' sword combined with Zelts' golden wind caused the tornado to turn a shimmering jade hue with traces of blue and gold in the lightning. Just as Romulus' Upgrade copied and evolved the semblances of others, this was an upgraded version of **Delta Storm** with tremendous power, wanting to end this fight with Alpha, his brother, Remus dubbed this new move **Omega Drive**.

When Remus, spinning within the tornado, made contact with the first shield it, broke instantly then broke through all the others with ease. The Alp- no, Romulus dropped Violet and Silver to position its arms forward to create more spherical force fields between it and Remus, but **Omega Drive** ripped through all of it. Violet and Silver were on the ground, but got as far away from Romulus as they could from within the confines of the translucent dome. Showing no resistance, Remus made it to his brother, breaking through the final barrier and his sword drilled into his brother's chest. The armor of Romulus was stronger than the force field, but was breaking apart from the pressing attack and so was Velocitas Eradico. Between the Romulus and the sword it was the former that broke first. Remus ran through his brother, completely destroying the chest and the damaged arm as the rest of Romulus stood in place before falling to the ground and so did Remus who tumbled to the ground from the team attack.

Violet and Silver managed to get on their feet and stared at the remains of probably their greatest adversary while Zelts leaned against a tree then slumped down till he was sitting on the ground. Somehow, Remus managed to stand up and looked at Velocitas Eradico's shattered form without the energy running through it anymore, it was in its final hour. He walked to the machination that was his brother's corpse and finally fell to his knees from exhaustion but kept his eye on Romulus. It was at this moment Umbra Amilius punched his monitor in anger, breaking it, getting small shards of glass in his fist, and stopping his view of the battle so he failed to see anything else transpire.

"Romulus... Dr. Lupa... she told me you were my brother. I don't really know what that means, but she said that you looked after me and took care of me before my memory got destroyed. And... I feel bad, I feel bad that I can't remember you or the moments we've shared together, but if it makes you feel better, I am happy just like you and Dr. Lupa wanted. Even if you've been dead for a long time, I'd think you'd feel better knowing if I was alright and I am. I just wanted to tell you that so please, rest in peace brother," Remus said to the mechanical remains of the Alpha as a way of communicating to Romulus.

Violet slowly trudged over to Remus' side due to all her injuries. Not all that sure how to console her young friend, she simply got down on one knee and placed a hand on his shoulder as some form of comfort. She didn't know if it was making him feel better at first but he formed a small smile that she couldn't see.

Silver, who was severely hurt from the fight, was leaning against the tree Zelts was sitting against because he was all out of energy. Silver saw Remus mourning his brother and watching his friend in pain made him feel a little bit of that pain as well. Grumbling to himself, Silver limped away from the scene with Zelts watching.

"Where are you going?" Zelts asked getting up at his own pace.

"Back to the Facility. There's still that bastard Amilius who started all this, once he's dealt with this will be over. Zelts stay here, you're too beat up to move and... you might see something you might not like when I get there," Silver said, still limping to the building. Zelts looked back at Remus and Violet then followed him and lucky for both of them, they were moving at a slow pace.

"You're in no better shape than me, so let's go together and put an end to this sad story," Zelts said, walking by a surprised Silver's side. Out of everyone in VRSZ, Zelts was the least likely to kill someone even if they wronged him, but after everything that has happened to him and his friends in Never-End and what transpired just now, that might have changed. Seeing his stalwart friend's change in moral code made Silver feel a little nervous about reaching Amilius, but he kept moving until they were met by Lupa who walked further in the forest to meet them.

* * *

 **Additional Information**

 **Years ago when Remus and Romulus still lived in their village, a large swarm of Grimm came in and destroyed everything. This random attack has more meaning than Team VRSZ will ever know. During this time, Jasper operated Never-End and had Zelts, Lily, Chrome, and other captives in his custody along with several bases of operation. The negativity of all the captives, specifically Chrome, always attracted a large number of Grimm that would sometimes follow them and proved to keep prying eyes from getting close to Never-End. The day Remus and Romulus' village was destroyed, Jasper was moving to one of his bases and their home was unfortunately near his route. The Grimm that followed the negative emotions unleashed hell on the village which led Romulus and Remus to travel around and encounter Lupa and Amilius and eventually brought Remus to VRSZ.** **In a way, Jasper screwed Remus over twice.**


	13. Happy Birthday

**Setting: Forest**

Silver and Zelts were slowly making their way back to the Facility to kill Amilius for Remus, but before they could continue walking, Niveus Lupa stood in their path. She knew very well what the boys' intentions were.

"If you're making your way to Amilius, then I'm here to tell you that it's too late. He watched the entire battle on his monitor and when he witnessed Remus destroy Romulus he didn't take it well and he's...he's too far gone now. The thing he put his heart and soul into for years was destroyed right before his eyes, he locked himself in his lab and he's trashing everything," Lupa said, feeling sad about her former friend's psychotic break from reality.

"Like I give a damn. Why shouldn't I put this guy out of our misery? Silver asked with a miffed expression. Zelts remained silent to see how this will pan out.

"Because someone else needs you more," she said looking to Remus.

Silver's expression changed when Lupa brought Remus into the mix. Zelts knew she was right so he turned around and went back to his friend. Silver scratched the back of his head while contemplating what she told him. He decided to stop his pursuit for now.

"Okay, I'll listen to you for now, but Amilius is going down. I don't care what you say," Silver said then turned back to walk to his teammates. Lupa was walking the same way at a much faster pace than the injured gunslinger. "He will but let it be by someone else's hand," Lupa said before passing him.

Remus stood to his feet now that he finished his grieving. Violet stood with him and noticed Zelts and Silver coming back, but she also saw Lupa so she put up a slightly angry face on. Remus looked up and saw Lupa walk up to him. They shared a silent moment as they looked in each others' eyes and could tell they had some form of closure. Lupa looked down at the nearly destroyed weapon in his hand and her eyes widened.

"Remus, Velocitas Eradico it's..."

Remus looked at his sword that had cracks everywhere and was about to break. "Yeah, it's done."

Lupa quickly took it from his hands and walked to the Facility. Remus, confused at her action, followed behind her, leaving his teammates behind to slowly tail them.

"Wh- what are you doing? You said it can't be fixed right? So what are you going to do with it?" he asked, doing his best to keep up with the faunus that started speed walking and he had a little trouble catching up.

" Velocitas Eradico can't be fixed, but there is another reason why I'm taking it. Remember when I first gave you this weapon, I told you it was an experimental weapon right? That was because the energy used in it is from a volatile, high energy dust crystal that is now going to explode and kill us all," she said and Remus stopped in his tracks for a few seconds before catching up to her.

"IT'S GOING TO EXPLODE?!"

The word explode caused his friends to stop following them and stay where they were before walking further away.

"Then...give it to me and I'll use Checkpoint to take it somewhere far away," Remus suggested, but Lupa shook her head.

"I already know where to put it, the Facility, this terrible place where lives were lost and ruined must be obliterated. With his prized Alpha gone, so is Amilius, I heard him curse and scream throughout the Facility, despite my thoughts that he would return to the way he was, but now after seeing him like that... that dream has died," Lupa said sadly, "This will be his resting place, here." She gave him back his sword.

 **Setting: Amilius' Laboratory**

The entire room was wrecked. Glass, books, and papers were scattered all over the floor. The capsules that used to house Amilius' creations were knocked over. The room gave the impression that an immature child threw a massive tantrum, but the only occupant in the room was a grown man slouching in his chair while staring into nothingness. Amilius' eyes were lifeless and his mind was fractured after the staggering breakdown he inflicted on himself. He was just as Lupa described, he was gone, all that remained was a hollow shell of his former self now that his life's work was finally surpassed by Lupa's Delta.

 **Setting: Outside the Facility**

"Put this anywhere around the Facility, the radius of the explosion will be large enough to destroy the building and the area around it. Go Remus." Just as Lupa finished speaking, the energy in the sword began to glow, signaling the imminent explosion.

Remus nodded before taking his weapon and teleported to the roof of the Facility. Before he did this, he looked at the sword and thought of everything he has done with it till now, but the reminiscing didn't last long as another crack formed and light began to emit from beneath it. He grabbed Velocitas Eradico by the grip and stabbed it into the steel exterior making it gain one final crack where the energy was beginning to shine through. He teleported back to Lupa, who got very far away from the building. Just as soon as he teleported away, Velocitas Eradico exploded and the highly volatile dust consumed the Facility, Amilius, the explosion was bigger than Lupa predicted because it even reached the remains of the Alpha, destroying the them completely. If this place wasn't secluded from the rest of the world, the explosion would've been seen and heard by now. The only witnesses, Lupa and Team VRSZ watched the event from a close, but fairly safe distance.

After a few moments, the explosion ceased and all that was remained was a large crater where the Facility used to be. The high energy from the unstable dust incinerated everything within its radius. Team VRSZ and Lupa watched the entire thing unfold. No one wanted to say anything after everything that happened until Silver broke the ice.

"Well that happened. Remus, you alright?"

Remus looked at him and answered with a nod.

"Good cause I think we've had enough for today. Let's go home."

Everyone made their way out of the forest as Violet led them to the rendezvous point. They were all feeling the pain from their grueling battle, except Lupa, who walked beside Remus. She stayed by his side, continuing to apologize for what she's done and he told her it was all okay, but he had things he wanted to say as well.

"What else can you tell me about myself, anything specific?"

Lupa had to think a little. This seemed out of the ordinary but it did help her take her mind off a everything that transpired. "Hmmm, if you want specifics, I did create a record of data when I first brought you in. In the notebook I wrote down that your blood type is O negative if you were ever wondering and your current height has increased since the last time I saw you, so you did grow in your absence," she said not sure what exactly Remus was fishing for.

"Could you try telling him something a little more personal," Silver interjected. He was walking ahead of them but was in earshot of their conversation. "Tell him something everyone has a right to know, like a birthday, you gotta know that."

"Birthday?" Remus was not sure what that word meant. Lupa remembered times like this when he didn't know what words or things were and always went to her for an answer. She kept in mind how it warmed her heart to teach him new things and this was one of those moments.

"A birthday is the day a person was born. Most people celebrate their birthday every year because it is seen as a very special occasion that happens once a year."

"Oh, so when is mine?" Remus asked.

Lupa thought back to her records and remembered the date she wrote down. " The twenty-first of April, that is your birthday," she said fondly.

"...I'll do my best to remember that," Remus said with a smile that made her smile too.

Silver grinned as he planned to tell everyone else about his birthday for next year.

 **Setting: Grasslands**

Team VRSZ and Lupa finally made it out of the forest and back to the grassy fields that served as the border between the forest and Vacuo's known desert terrain. Pulling out her scroll, Violet dialed Clair de Lune's number to call for an escort.

"Hello Clair...yes we need a lift home... uh huh we got him back, it was a success and we're bringing one extra... no he won't need another visit to the hospital, we all just need some rest." When Violet conversed with Clair she left out details like Romulus or Remus losing his eye because she knew Clair might go overboard with caring for him. Everyone waited patiently as a task force car along Clair's black car came into view.

 _"Oh no she came too?"_ Violet thought not expecting her to tag along.

Clair got out of her car to greet her friends, but her smile vanished in an instant when she saw how beaten up Team VRSZ was, especially the bandages wrapped around Remus' head. She immediately walked over to Remus and invaded his personal space.

"What happened to you?!" she asked while holding his head between her hands.

"I lost my eye and I killed my brother," he said this like it wasn't a big deal. His teammates silently groaned at his lack of tact. Clair did not handle that well, the shock was apparent on her face.

"Come along, tell me everything on the way home," she said already walking back to her car.

The rest of VRSZ walked to Clair's car while Lupa went to the task force car to ride with Clair's escort. Remus saw this and felt bad that she had to ride by herself, so he changed course to ride with her. His teammates looked at him confused but thought maybe they needed some alone time and after what everyone has been through, they were too tired to persuade him otherwise. Violet looked over him a little longer before Zelts called her over and sat in the passenger seat.

The two vehicles drove through the desert as the sun began to set, making the sky have a beautifully array of warm colors that could soothe any heart. Zelts and Silver informed Clair about all the details of what happened while Violet stared out the window absentmindedly. At times she would look at the side mirror to see the second vehicle that carried the faunus and her friend, she wondered what they could be talking about.

"Wallflower, wallflower, you are being quite reserved in this conversation. Nothing to add to this very interesting story?" Clair said while driving. Violet's eyes were on her then back out the window. "Not really, I'm just ready to head home," Violet said closing her eyes not wanting to talk anymore.

Clair thought Violet was getting jealous of Remus' relationship with Dr. Lupa, probably thinking it was closer than the relationship he had with her. She inwardly giggled at Violet's feelings. In the other car, Remus was in the back with Lupa telling her something. Whatever he was saying didn't seem to bode well with the wolf faunus as she seemed to show signs of doubt about what he said.

"Are you sure you want to do this? What about your friends? I don't they'll agree to this," she said worried more about Remus than herself.

"... I'll find a way to tell them."

 **Setting: VRSZ Base**

Clair drove VRSZ all the way to their home in Vantablack while the other car drove to take Lupa to a small hotel for her to use as a temporary home. The Lady of Fortuna waved goodbye and wished them a good night as she drove back to Concordia. Silver and Zelts walked up to their front door to head inside, but Zelts noticed Violet was still standing in front of the house.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"Remus didn't come home. I still don't trust that woman," Violet said still looking for any sign of her friend.

"I know you don't like her but I'm sure you can trust Remus to come back."

Violet was about to make her rebuttal until Remus teleported right in front of her, scaring her as she yelped in surprise. He looked at her with a smile on his face and it seemed to have calmed her, all the suspicious thoughts in her head vanished like that. "I almost forgot you leveled up Remus," she said with a light giggle at the end.

"Yeah, when I use it to go to an area I can't see, it kinda feels like I'm jumping in blind, but this place is home, I know it and Fortuna by heart," he said as he turned to walk inside.

Violet had a earnest smile that wasn't going away when she heard him say that. Even when everyone was having dinner together it didn't fade despite her teammates looking at her like she grew a second head. She had her smile all throughout the night, even as she slept, she was glad that her team was back together again. Remus, on the other hand, wasn't asleep or in his sleeping attire. He had a serious look on his face as he had a packed bag on his back and had a piece of paper in his hand.

* * *

 **Additional Information**

 **Remus will not receive a new theme like Silver and Zelts did. He and Violet will get new ones later on.**

 **An appropriate ending song for the Remus & Romulus arc is New World by Charice. Romulus has been searching for a place for Remus to call home and show him that Remnant isn't a bad place even though neither of them knew what life was like outside their village. This song is Remus telling his brother that he has made a living for himself in Remnant and he made it here because of Romulus's sacrifices. Even though his brother is dead he wants Romulus to know that it was thanks to him he can find new strength and resolve.**

 **With the reveal of his date of birth, each member has their own birthday and a coinciding season:**

 **Violet: February 9th, Winter**

 **Remus: April 21st, Spring**

 **Silver: July 17th, Summer**

 **Zelts: November 28th, Fall**


	14. Divided We Stand

**Setting: VRSZ Base**

It was the day after the whole Facility fiasco and Violet was the first to awaken which she found odd because she woke up on her own. The norm in their base was that Remus would teleport into her room, wake her up by invading her personal space, and they would all have breakfast made by Silver. Today was not one of those days as Violet saw no sign of her young friend, but she didn't give it much thought. She knew he has been through a lot, so she expected him to stay indoors all day despite his usual positive demeanor, granted, he couldn't do much anyway with his weapon destroyed and being half blind.

Fully dressed, she walked down stairs expecting to smell food, but smelt nothing in the kitchen. When she walked downstairs she saw Zelts was the one who was awake and he had a grim expression.

"What's that look for?" she asked concerned. She didn't see it at first but he was holding a piece of paper.

"You'll understand when you read this, but please brace yourself," he said, handing it to her. Violet saw that the paper had some writing on it.

 _Violet, Silver, Zelts, I wanted to tell this to you guys in person, but I knew none of you would've allowed it. Also this is my first letter so please overlook any mistakes. The past few days have really been something. I learned about my brother, my real past, and the purpose Dr. Lupa had in store for me, to be her representation of perfection through a person's inner potential. After everything I've been through with you guys as a freelancer and all the training I spent as the Delta has helped me understand one thing: I am weak._

 _Together we were able to do amazing things. Defeating Terra Cotta and Turquoise, fight off Greyhound, eliminate Never-End, and stop Amilius, but like I said, those were things we were able to do together. I don't think I could've done any of that on my own and it bothers me how true that statement sounds. I want to be stronger, not for myself, but for you guys. It's no surprise to you all that I'm the weakest member on the team. Zelts is a better fighter, Silver is much more clever and I can't even compare with Violet in anyway, you're just too cool. If I get stronger I won't be a liability anymore and I can stand on equal footing with you guys, I want that more than anything and that's why I'm leaving. I asked Dr. Lupa to come with me and help train me like she used to, except better. She was against this too but I convinced her this is for the best, see, she worries about me just like you guys. Violet, I know you don't trust her all that much, but you trust in me right? So trust in me that I'll be safe with her._

 _Dr. Lupa said we'll be traveling for my training in order to get stronger and to find my hidden potential so I don't know how long this take but as soon as she gives the okay, I'm gonna come back home as fast as possible and show you guys how different I am._

 _Until Next Time, Remus Cobalt_

 _P.S. Don't worry about the eye thing. Dr. Lupa said it will only be temporary. To be honest, I don't know what she means by that._

Violet finished reading the note and she was shocked. Zelts was sad as he kept his gaze to one of the corners in the kitchen. She tightened her fists causing the letter to wrinkle and crumble.

"How can he do this? We just got him back and- and he leaves without saying goodbye. I don't want to believe this," Violet said feeling hurt.

"I'm not too sure it was easy for him either. His handwriting is clearly shaky, I get the feeling that this wasn't an easy decision to make on his end. And at the bottom corner of the paper there are some traces of tear stains." Zelts inhaled a breath before speaking again. "He was right about us not agreeing to this, but I think this is what he needs."

"How can you say that?! He needs to be with us. Like he said, together we can do anything so why did you think him leaving is a good thing?" Violet asked irritated but mostly confused. Despite her tone, Zelts answered her calmly because he knew that what she needed this from him right now.

"You're not wrong, but you have to understand this is more than him just leaving, Remus... is on a journey of self discovery. He wants to grow not only as a fighter but mostly as a person. In order to move forward with us, he felt like he needed to be on his own for a while. If memory serves, you told me before how you faked your own death to escape your family to be your own person." The fact that he brought up her past to show the similarities made Violet understand much more even if she didn't like it.

"..." She had no way to refute his words.

"Then you know better than the rest of us that he needs to see this through. Don't get me wrong, I'd rather have him back too, but this is necessary for personal growth. Besides, he said he's coming back, so we just have to wait."

Hearing his explanation did relax her a bit. Silently she nodded, letting him know she agreed with him though she was still sad about Remus leaving. "There's only one thing left to do, which one of us is going to tell Silver?" she said jokingly to lighten the mood.

Even with Team VRSZ down to three members, they continued their work as freelancers. Two weeks passed since Remus left and things have been quite an adjustment, but each member has made it through in their own way. However, things changed even more when Zelts got an email on his scroll from Lily. She told him that she has been travelling with the children who were former captives of Never-End and helping each of them find their old homes or help them make new ones, but roaming Grimm and their large group made it very difficult for her and some of the older kids to fight them off. Lily asked Zelts if he could come and assist her in finding safe places for these kids. She was near the border between Vacuo and Vale where she waited a few days to hear his reply.

Zelts informed his teammates about Lily's request. Violet and Silver understood and offered to join as well to help their friend, but Zelts told her that he wants to do this alone, surprising his teammates. He told them that Jasper collected children from all over Remnant and this was a task that will take a very long time to accomplish even with their help. Violet was reluctant at first but she realized that Lily really did need him more, so she was okay, taking it much better than when she did with Remus because she knew both of them will come back.

For another week it has been Silver and Violet doing jobs for a while, but Violet didn't seem to be her usual self. She accepted that Remus and Zelts had to leave, but that doesn't mean she wasn't going to miss them. Violet was thankful she still had Silver but the vacancy left by her other teammates was great. Silver wasn't a fool, he was aware of Violet's attitude and knew exactly what she needed to overcome this pit in her stomach, a vacation, some time to herself to help clear her head. Silver brought up the topic in the most polite manner he could for a sorrowful teammate.

"Get out."

"Huh?" she said not getting what he meant.

"Sorry, I'm being too mean, let me try a softer approach. You are a sour puss that is getting on my last nerves and you need to leave, get some down time," he said fishing for something in his pocket. He pulled it out before Violet had time to refuse.

"This is a ticket to an oasis south of Vacuo near the Vacuo-Vale border, nice place, very little Grimm attacks compared to Fortuna so it's relaxing. I bought you this with my own money and there's no refund, believe me I checked, so you have no choice but to accept. Take it, you neeeeed to unwiiiind. I'll hold down the fort till you return boss, someone's gotta make sure no one ransacks the place."

Violet looked at his face seeing beneath it all Silver really was thinking about her well-being. She let out a breath, smiled, and did something uncharacteristic of her, she patted Silver on the head affectionately. Silver reeled back in confusion as he looked at Violet's playful smile with fear.

 _"Dear god did she finally snap?"_ Silver thought to himself, thinking he may have done too much and he only got more scared when she started laughing.

"For me to be in such a pathetic state that even you picked up on it." She took the ticket from his hand and looked at it. "Very well, I accept your kind offer. It'll be a bit lonely without you, but I think I can manage. I can already assume you'll be using your free time to catch up with Bianca."

"...Maybe..." Silver said looking away from Violet who laughed at him.

 **Three Days Later**

 **Setting: Airship Docks**

Violet had a packed bag, ticket in hand, and a small smile on her face as she looked at her airship's gate. Behind her was Silver with his arms crossed and a grin. They made it to the time and place Violet's airship was ready to take off.

"Soooo about time for me to get on board?" she said to Silver a little hesitant about leaving.

"Yup."

"That's all you have to say? Yup?" Violet asked amused and Silver reacted by shrugging his shoulders.

"It's only a luxury vacation, you'll be back in about a month. Anyway I'm all tired out from all the goodbyes you got from everyone else, particularly Clair, she... wouldn't let go of you until Sterling and Blood intervened," Silver said and the memory made Violet giggle.

"Moreover, I'm going to be seeing all of you again so there's no reason for us to say goodbye. Just... I'll see ya when I see ya," Silver said uncrossing his arms then shoved his hands into his pants pockets.

Violet smiled at his words and nodded in agreement. Her flight was called and she boarded the airship, looking back at Silver one last time, seeing him wave her off before entering the airship. Silver watched from the ground as Violet's airship soared through the sky. Once it was out of sight he walked back to the base wondering what he was going to do for the rest of the day.

"I haven't seen Ghost in a while, maybe I'll pop by to annoy him."

 **Four Hours Later**

 **Setting: Oasis**

Violet's airship finally touched down on the ground and she was ready to get out of her cramped seat. Once she made it out of the transport the first thing she did was stretch her arms up as high as they could go. _"Of course Silver goes for coach,"_ she thought a little vexed but not so much that it would ruin her day. She walked out of the docks with her bag then began her vacation by enjoying a nice stroll through the town to the resort Silver recommended. Unbeknownst to her, someone in a cloak was following her.

Violet almost made it to her destination, but on her way there she couldn't help but feel like someone's eyes have been on her this whole time. She turned around to see nothing out of the ordinary so Violet continued on her path, but remained vigilant by checking her surroundings. It took her ten minutes for her destination to be in her sights but the presence of someone stalking her was very noticeable and she found it tiresome. Wanting to face whoever it was that was pestering her, Violet searched around for her target and didn't see anything out of the ordinary until she saw a tall figure in a dark brown cloak who disappeared the minute the person was in Violet's line of sight. Violet smirked because she already saw the unknown person and ran after them. Violet's pursuit took her away from the resort and closer to the Vacuo-Vale border where she could see the trees of a nearby forest. Whoever she was chasing was quick on their feet because whenever Violet saw the person it was only glimpses of their cloak, just enough for her not to lose sight of her mark until she turned the corner of a building near the edge of town. Violet surveyed the area but didn't see the cloaked figure in the town but in the forest right outside the town lurking next to a tree before her target ran deeper into the woods where she continued her chase.

Now that they were the only ones in the forest, Violet thought keeping track of the mysterious figure would be easy, but the person actually vanished without a trace. Violet slowed down to gauge her surroundings and to listen out for her target but heard nothing out of the ordinary. She walked carefully through the forests, ready to draw her Vorpal Swords if she needed to. Something was stepping on twigs and tree branches east of Violet so she walked there with caution and both her hands inches away from her weapons. She got closer and closer, but she took one more step and suddenly she was caught in a net lifting her up in the air, but being a quick thinker and having fast reflexes, Violet drew her Vorpal Sword daggers. She quickly cut the net open before she was hoisted too high up, then landed safely on her feet and when she did the cloaked figure came out and attacked her.

Up close, the figure towered over Violet but difference in size didn't make the girl falter. She tried to cut the figure down with her daggers but they clashed with a larger mechanical knife then received a swift and strong kick to the gut that knocked her a few feet away. Violet flipped to land on her feet again and moved in to fight again, but on closer inspection of the weapon she ceased her assault.

"I didn't think I'd ever see you again Absinthe." When Violet said his name the hunter removed his cloak confirming her guess. The bounty hunter looked the same way Violet remembered.

"You'd assume that after you and your little friends beat me and tried to bury me under tons of rubble. I've survived far worse" he said.

"We didn't beat you, we sucker punched you and you know it. I'm big enough to admit we had no chance at beating you head on, I couldn't even beat you now if I tried," Violet said, appearing calm but looking for a way to escape.

"Defeat is defeat, it doesn't matter what form it takes. I'm big enough to admit I lost that day and it has only made me more interested in you, apprentice."

"Former apprentice, though I never planned to go along with your stupid ideas for me," Violet said, taking a small step back.

This didn't go unnoticed by Absinthe who moved too fast for Violet to react. He took something from one of the pockets in his flak jacket and threw it at her. The object was a small orb-shaped bottle filled with sleep gas that broke open when it hit the ground. The gas consumed Violet and before she could fight back she fell to her knees then to the ground knocked out. Absinthe walked up then knelt next to her unconscious body and ungraciously picked her up only to walk away from the resort and town to parts unknown.

 **Setting: Unknown**

Violet woke from her dreamless sleep feeling surprisingly comfortable. Getting up she noticed that she was laying in a bed in some kind of wood cabin based on the interior of the walls and a nearby window displaying nothing but trees. Remembering that she was fighting Absinthe before she fell asleep, Violet quickly got out of bed, drew her Vorpal Swords, and got in her battle stance, however, she realized she was alone in the room. She carefully scouted the entirety of the small cabin and learned she was the only occupant despite finding clear evidence that this place does belonged to Absinthe. One thing that did catch her eye was an envelope with her name written on it placed on a coffee table. She opened it finding two things in there. The first thing she pulled was a letter addressed to her.

 _Violet Tulipe, it is clear that you are against my desire to make you my apprentice and become the greatest bounty hunter in Remnant, I've made my peace with that. I have a new role for you to play, the role as the world's greatest prey. The people you and your friends killed in Never-End left some important and political spaces empty throughout Remnant and the few that did survive, I managed to pull some strings and create for you a bounty._

Hearing she had a bounty again shocked Violet as she guessed what was the second thing inside the envelope. She reached into it and pulled out her new bounty poster which upset her further when she saw what it said:

 _Violet Tulipe, The Violent Flower of the Desert: $400,000; Dead or Alive._

Seeing the enormous bounty on her head disturbed Violet greatly, it seemed absolutely ridiculous to her why the bounty was that great amount. This was clearly put together by Absinthe in some way, but whether this was real or not is yet to be seen. She continued reading the message hoping it would help explain things.

 _This bounty will be distributed around the world in due time, but there are those like you who have received early copies, thus starting our game. Your goal is simple, survive. Bounty hunters, huntsmen, huntresses, anyone who wants to grab that money or think of you as an evil threat that must be vanquished will come after you non-stop, myself included. Your options are to fight, run, die, or win by completing one simple task, defeating me in battle. Once you have beaten or killed me the bounty will disappear, but that's only if you survive long enough to find me. And as a precautionary measure, I destroyed your scroll so you wouldn't contact any of your friends._

She reached into her pocket after reading this part to confirm his statement and it proved to be right. Even her wallet with her money was gone, all that remained on her person were the clothes on her back and what amount of Vorpal Swords she currently had in her possession. Grunting in frustration, she read what was left on the message.

 _If the destruction of your phone wasn't a clear enough message then allow me to be frank, this is something you must do alone. Contact or communicate with any of your friends and I'll kill them, simple as that, so don't get any bright ideas, my eyes will be on you at all times. Find me, face me, unearth what kind of person you truly are, hunter or prey. Take as long as you need, but remember time isn't on your side._

Violet finished the letter with feelings of entrapment and the creeping solitude that came with it. She surveyed the surrounding area of the cabin and saw there was no one around, so she walked out feeling nauseous being in Absinthe's residence but that feeling was immediately replaced with a sense of worry because she was no longer in the woods near the resort. Violet was in unknown territory with no idea if she was still in Vacuo, she could've been anywhere in Remnant right now and no one knew she was gone. She grinded her teeth in frustration which transformed into a snarl then a booming scream.

After releasing her anger, Violet's face was surprisingly composed. She took a deep breath then looked to the sky through the thick trees and thought of her friends. Violet thought of Remus leaving to grow stronger, Zelts going to help Lily with her mission, and Silver watching over everything in her absence. Violet did something out of the ordinary for the situation she was trapped in, she smiled happily yet mischievous as her eyes flared with great strength of will.

"Everyone's doing their own thing now," she said to herself because she needed to say this aloud. "My boys have been growing and I need to do the same... no, I need to do better than them to remain their leader. Absinthe, this game of yours may prove to do just that, if I can't win the game, then I can't cut it as leader of Team VRSZ." She started walking off in a random direction with the same determined look and smile.

"Boys, it may take longer than a month, but I promise I'll be back and you'll see someone worthy of leading you all." Violet walked further into the forest with her force of will shining through.

* * *

 **Additional Information**

 **Violet's ending song is Shiki No Uta (English Cover) by Sapphire. She's traveling around Remnant all on her own yearning to go back to her friends, but as long as Absinthe was threatening to kill them she had no choice but to play along and find him first. The lyrics are her inner feelings about wanting to spend her days with the people she cares about, but is unable to be at their side. Despite being apart, Violet still thinks of them on her long and dangerous journey and her willpower and desire to see them again will be thing that helps get her through Absinthe's game.**

 **The lyrics mention different times of the year in seasons and each season represents a member of Team VRSZ with Remus as spring, Silver as summer, Zelts as autumn, and Violet as winter. This part of the song explains how long Violet has been separated from her party with the signs of winter coming meaning she has been gone for at least a year. It is no surprise that out of all the people she's thinking about, her boys hold a special place in her heart.**


	15. And The Story Continues

**Setting: Fortuna**

It has been three days since Silver last saw Violet leave for her needed vacation and he spent them at his leisure, mostly lazing about the base, doing some cooking jobs in Edesia, and hanging out with Ghost whenever he could get a hold of him. After feeling like a sloth, he eventually went out to Moneta to do some missions to pay the bills, buy food and supplies, etc. On rare occasions Silver was able to rope Ghost into helping him on missions too much for him to do himself now that he was the sole member of Team VRSZ left in Fortuna. Two weeks went by and Silver, with all this time in the base by himself, was feeling a bit lonely even though he sent Violet away on vacation for the very same reason, but without someone around to tell him. However that was what Silver thought, but the truth was Ghost found his demeanor to be rather annoying. Ghost didn't mind seeing his friend more often because Bianca and Blood were relieving him of most of his work, but his more solemn attitude was getting on his nerves.

He didn't have the heart to tell Silver to is face because his emotions were understandable now that his teammates and friends were gone, so Ghost told his sister who was someone as close to Silver as he was but has known him far longer. Ghost spoke to Bianca hoping she could find a way to remedy Silver's problem, however, because his sister was almost always working by Clair de Lune's side so whatever he told her he indirectly told Clair. The two women offered their own solutions for Silver's solitude; Bianca thought that getting some time off to spend personal time with him would help but Clair smiled when she thought of her own solution, a project spearheaded by Bianca that they have been working on for some time. The last time Ghost went to them about Silver, Clair told Ghost to bring him to Concordia.

 **Setting: Concordia**

Ghost did what Clair asked him to do and brought Silver to her office where they were met by not only Clair and Bianca, but Blood was there as well. Silver didn't know what to make of the situation. If anything, this could be some kind of intervention for something.

"This isn't an intervention is it?" he asked worried, but Clair waved her hand to dismiss the idea.

"Heheheh, no Silver this is nothing of the sorts. What we have in mind is a proposition, you are free to choose whether you accept or not. We've taken notice that you have been... rather down ever since Team VRSZ took a temporary leave of absence." When he heard her say this he tried to deny her claim, but he couldn't bring himself to lie about it anymore. He remained silent but that was enough for everyone else to know Clair's words rang true so she continued.

"My friendship with Violet aside, I care for you Silver, you and every member of VRSZ are precious to me. I was hurt when Remus and Zelts left and Violet going on vacation for a month upset me as well, but you being all alone hurts just the same. To keep your mind and body in tip top shape when the others return, I thought it would be best if you officially worked for me as one of my personal members of staff, like the others here. A new team doing work, special tasks I only allow for the best in my employ, the very people in this room, Silver, if you accept you will be the third to join."

"Third?"

"Yes, this team will be led by Bianca and Blood already agreed, though Ghost said he wouldn't join until we found another, so he's technically the fourth. What do you say Silver? Join this team and take on difficult missions for the future Fortuna and to cure your loneliness by being on a team again?" Clair asked playfully because this going her way, she even knew the answer Silver was going to choose.

"Alright, I mean I guess this will give me something to do while Violet's on vacation. Where do I sign?" he said in a cocky manner, but it only amused the Lady of Fortuna. Bianca and Blood moved to stand beside Silver and Ghost.

"Bianca, Ash Blood, Silver Synch, and Ghost; today you will be the force that will aid in Fortuna's growth and social standing in Remnant as Team BASG (Beige) with Bianca as your leader. Your first assignment will be given in three days, until then you are dismissed," Clair said, telling everyone else to leave her office. She needed to work on the finishing touches on her reconstruction plan.

The newly formed Team BASG left Clair's office and Bianca already discussed plans with Blood then walked to Silver to see if he was alright. "Silver, I know I haven't been around as much as you'd like me to be, but the formation of this team will change that. I'm no replacement for your real team but I hope you can find some sort of solace in it," she said as they walked out of Concordia and were in the streets.

"I have no problems with you guys, if anything, I have to do more work on this team so I won't be a liability. This will kinda be like the old days when you were my boss in Greyhound, except now we're like badass secret agents. Am I right Blood?" Silver said elbowing the bat faunus in the arm.

"Hmph, yeah. Should be interesting and should get Ghost to be more lively," he joked and Ghost laughed sarcastically. Silver felt like this team was already starting off well.

 _"A month of this will be something to tell Violet when she gets back,"_ Silver thought, still believing Violet was coming backing a month.

Team BASG has been doing missions all around Fortunasuch as stopping corruption, attempted overthrows, protecting Clair de Lune Vantablack when she travels, and gathering intelligence on people who Clair deemed necessary to spy on. Their missions even took them out of Fortuna and to other areas around Vacuo. Three weeks passed and Silver didn't hear a thing from Violet, but got news about her in a terrible way. Clair brought the team in and seemed to be distraught before presenting her reason, a wanted poster for Violet with a 400,000 Lien reward. Silver was at first surprised, confused, then angry about how this happened. He tried to call her multiple times but got nothing and it only made it worse. Feeling the same way, Clair decided to task Team BASG with finding Violet and gather as much information about her as possible in order to find the reason for this bounty and try to get rid of it.

Despite their efforts, Violet proved to be an elusive target they could never get their hands on. As time passed they began to hear stories here and there, but nothing concrete, except two things; she was travelling around the world fighting off all kinds of pursuers and she seemed to be looking for someone. Along with Violet, Silver began to hear rumors about his other teammates like two warriors who protect the next generation and tales of a wolf and a boy in blue roaming the world. Not wanting to disrupt the others, Silver kept up his search for Violet whenever he wasn't doing missions for Team BASG, hoping he could help her and bring her back home, but he never found her in person no matter how much he searched. He almost felt like Violet was doing her best to avoid him.

Time passed and the seasons changed. Violet has the world after her, Remus was training to better himself as a person, Silver has become a part of Fortuna's new task force, and Zelts was helping Lily find homes for the lost children. It will a very long time before Team VRSZ finally reunites in the place where their story began.

 **Team VRSZ Volume Three: End**

* * *

 **Additional Information**

 **I'd first like to make a shout out to Epic Zealot Productions 2.0 who added all my VRSZ stories to his favorites.**

 **If Team VRSZ were actually students of Beacon Academy it would be interesting. Silver would be a lazy student that does his best to sleep in class and just barely pass his classes. He would go to Violet and badger her non-stop until she submits and lets him copy her homework and trick Remus into doing most of the wok in group projects.** **Violet would be similar to Blake, someone who keeps to herself and enjoys reading books and a little introvert but has Remus , Silver, and Zelts as her close friends. She performs well in her combat and studies. In her academy life Violet reluctantly became friends with her teammates because their annoying nature grew on her.** **I'm not sure if Zelts would be too to be a student so I think he would be an assistant professor that some of the female students have a crush on. If he was a professor, he would help the members of VRSZ and other students during school hours then hang out with VRSZ as friends and teammates. Remus is the type of person who would enjoy school learning new things everyday. He would be the only student that would actually sit and listen to Professor Port stories with a smile on his face.** **In this new life Remus and Romulus recently moved to Vale and Remus enrolled into Beacon Academy as a new student meeting his future teammates.**


End file.
